Lottery attractiveness and presentation mode of probability and value information

The attractiveness of lotteries that vary in p (probability) and o (outcome) depends on the presentation mode of p and o information. Extending previous findings on temporally experienced p, we manipulate the numerically stated versus spatially experienced format of both p (graphical presentation of a distribution of lottery tickets in an urn) and o (distribution of money notes). Lottery attractiveness ratings were sensitive to the expected value (EV), but p received more weight than o at constant EV levels (p‐dominance). Both EV sensitivity and p‐dominance were enhanced for experienced p and numerical o. This format particularly revealed the unattractiveness of low‐p lotteries. Experiencing p was functional in terms of accuracy and high‐risk avoidance, but only when the task environments rendered p diagnostic of EV. The presentation mode manipulations did not affect the initial perception stage but the relative weighting of p and o in the final judgment integration stage. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How to switch on and switch off semantic priming effects for natural and artifactual categories: activation processes in category memory depend on focusing specific feature dimensions

"Semantic priming" refers to the phenomenon that people react faster to target words preceded by semantically related rather than semantically unrelated words. We wondered whether momentary mind sets modulate semantic priming for natural versus artifactual categories. We interspersed a category priming task with a second task that required participants to react to either the perceptual or action features of simple geometric shapes. Focusing on perceptual features enhanced semantic priming effects for natural categories, whereas focusing on action features enhanced semantic priming effects for artifactual categories. In fact, significant priming effects emerged only for those categories thought to rely on the features activated by the second task. This result suggests that (a) priming effects depend on momentary mind set and (b) features can be weighted flexibly in concept representations; it is also further evidence for sensory-functional accounts of concept and category representation.     

Long-term visual associations affect attentional guidance

When observers perform a visual search task, they are assumed to adopt an attentional set for what they are looking for. The present experiment investigates the influence of long-term visual memory associations on this attentional set. On each trial, observers were asked to search a display for a grayscale version of a known traffic sign. On each trial, a distractor sign was drawn in full color. This color could either be related or unrelated to the target sign. Distractors interfered more with search when their color was related (e.g. red when the target was a stop sign), implying that long-term color associations resulted in inadvertent attentional guidance, even though color was irrelevant to the task. The results add to the growing body of evidence that long-term memory representations automatically affect attentional orienting.     

Looking, language, and memory: Bridging research from the visual world and visual search paradigms

In the visual world paradigm as used in psycholinguistics, eye gaze (i.e. visual orienting) is measured in order to draw conclusions about linguistic processing. However, current theories are underspecified with respect to how visual attention is guided on the basis of linguistic representations. In the visual search paradigm as used within the area of visual attention research, investigators have become more and more interested in how visual orienting is affected by higher order representations, such as those involved in memory and language. Within this area more specific models of orienting on the basis of visual information exist, but they need to be extended with mechanisms that allow for language-mediated orienting. In the present paper we review the evidence from these two different – but highly related – research areas. We arrive at a model in which working memory serves as the nexus in which long-term visual as well as linguistic representations (i.e. types) are bound to specific locations (i.e. tokens or indices). The model predicts that the interaction between language and visual attention is subject to a number of conditions, such as the presence of the guiding representation in working memory, capacity limitations, and cognitive control mechanisms.     

Similarity and categorization: from vision to touch

Even though human perceptual development relies on combining multiple modalities, most categorization studies so far have focused on the visual modality. To better understand the mechanisms underlying multisensory categorization, we analyzed visual and haptic perceptual spaces and compared them with human categorization behavior. As stimuli we used a three-dimensional object space of complex, parametrically-defined objects. First, we gathered similarity ratings for all objects and analyzed the perceptual spaces of both modalities using multidimensional scaling analysis. Next, we performed three different categorization tasks which are representative of every-day learning scenarios: in a fully unconstrained task, objects were freely categorized, in a semi-constrained task, exactly three groups had to be created, whereas in a constrained task, participants received three prototype objects and had to assign all other objects accordingly. We found that the haptic modality was on par with the visual modality both in recovering the topology of the physical space and in solving the categorization tasks. We also found that within-category similarity was consistently higher than across-category similarity for all categorization tasks and thus show how perceptual spaces based on similarity can explain visual and haptic object categorization. Our results suggest that both modalities employ similar processes in forming categories of complex objects.     

Changing CS features alters evaluative responses in evaluative conditioning

Evaluative conditioning (EC) refers to changes in people's evaluative responses toward initially neutral stimuli (CSs) by mere spatial and temporal contiguity with other positive or negative stimuli (USs). We investigate whether changing CS features from conditioning to evaluation also changes people's evaluative response toward these CSs. We used computer-generated male faces as CSs and paired them with other positively or negatively evaluated faces. When participants evaluated the CS faces, they either appeared unchanged, with glasses, with beards, or glasses and beards. Unchanged faces showed a clear conditioning effect, while all other face versions showed no significant conditioning effects. The conditioning effect also depended on participants’ awareness of a CS's respective US. These results mirror configural explanations of stimulus generalization in classical conditioning, with implications for EC as explanation for attitude acquisition and learning of likes and dislikes in everyday life.     

Differences in the strength of distractor inhibition do not affect distractor–response bindings

Distractor inhibition and distractor–response binding were investigated in two experiments by analyzing distractor repetition benefits and their interaction with response repetition effects in a sequential-priming paradigm. Distractor repetition benefits were larger for distractors that were incompatible with the to-be-executed response (task-related distractors) than for distractors that were not assigned to a response (neutral distractors), indicating that the strength of distractor inhibition was a function of response interference for the distractors. In contrast, the distractor–response bindings were found to be of equal strength for both task-related and neutral distractors. Thus, differences in the strengths of distractor inhibition did not affect the integration of distractors with responses into event files. Instead, our results suggest that distractor–response binding and distractor inhibition are independent mechanisms that are recruited for the automatization of behavior and action control.     

Timing: A missing key ingredient in typical fMRI studies of emotion

Lindquist et al. provide a compelling summary of the brain bases of the onset of emotion. Their conclusions, however, are constrained by typical fMRI techniques that do not assess a key ingredient in emotional experience - timing. We discuss the importance of timing in theories of emotion as well as the implications of neural temporal dynamics for psychological constructionism.     

Social influence in newly formed groups: The roles of personal and social intentions, group norms, and social identity

Intentions to participate in a group activity in newly formed groups were followed over time. Two forms of intentions were examined: traditional behavioral intention to take part in a group-based act (personal intention), and social intentions to act as an agent of the group (social intention). In addition, the study explored other group process variables as distinctive predictors of ‘social identification’. The paper concludes with a discussion of the role of social intentions, linking the findings to social identification development and maintenance over time.