Utilization of covariation knowledge in source monitoring: no evidence for implicit processes

In three experiments, a "hidden covariation" (Lewicki, in Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 12, 135-146, 1986) of nonsalient stimulus attributes and the source of stimulus information was established to test whether implicit knowledge about this correlation influences source memory judgments. The source monitoring framework (Johnson, Hashtroudi, and Lindsay, in Psychological Bulletin, 114, 3-28, 1993) postulates heuristic and strategic judgment processes in source attributions. A multinomial model analysis disentangled memory and guessing processes. While there were large strategic guessing biases involving explicit knowledge in all experiments, there was no evidence for the use of implicit covariation knowledge. Only participants who were later able to verbalize the covariation had shown corresponding biases during the source memory test, suggesting that implicit covariation knowledge plays no prominent role in the reconstruction processes in source monitoring.     

History of experimental psychology from an Estonian perspective

A short review of the development of experimental psychology from an Estonian perspective is presented. The first rector after the reopening of the University of Dorpat (Tartu) in 1802, Georg Friedrich Parrot (1767–1852) was interested in optical phenomena which he attempted to explain by introducing the concept of unconscious inferences, anticipating a similar theory proposed by Herman von Helmholtz 20 years later. One of the next rectors, Alfred Wilhelm Volkmann (1800–1878) was regarded by Edwin Boring as one of the founding fathers of the experimental psychology. Georg Wilhelm Struve (1793–1864) played an essential part in solving the problem of personal equations. Arthur Joachim von Oettingen (1836–1920) developed a theory of music harmony, which stimulated his student Wilhelm Friedrich Ostwald (1853–1932) to study colour harmony. Emil Kraepelin (1856–1926), the founder of modern psychiatry, is by far the most important experimental psychologist who has worked in Estonia. His successor Wladimir von Tchisch (1855–1922), another student of Wilhelm Wundt, continued Kraepelin’s work in experimental psychology. The lives of Wolfgang Köhler (1887–1967), who was born in Reval (Tallinn), and Oswald Külpe (1862–1915), who graduated from the University of Dorpat, extended the link between the history of experimental psychology and Estonia. Karl Gustav Girgensohn (1875–1925), the founder of the Dorpat School of the psychology of religion, stretched the use of experimental methods to the study of religious experience.     

Emotional responses in spider fear are closely related to picture awareness

Theories of emotion propose that responses to emotional pictures can occur independently of whether or not people are aware of the picture content. Because evidence from dissociation paradigms is inconclusive, we manipulated picture awareness gradually and studied whether emotional responses varied with degree of awareness. Spider fearful and non-fearful participants viewed pictures of spiders and flowers at four levels of backward masking while electrodermal activity and heart rate were measured continuously. Recognition ratings confirmed that participants’ picture awareness decreased with masking. Critically, effects of spider fear on emotion ratings and heart rate also decreased with masking. These findings suggest that effects of spider fear on emotion ratings and heart rate are closely related to picture awareness.