Perception in action: multiple roles of sensory information in action control

Perceptual processes play a central role in the planning and control of human voluntary action. Indeed, planning an action is a sensorimotor process operating on sensorimotor units, a process that is based on anticipations of perceptual action effects. I discuss how the underlying sensorimotor units emerge, and how they can be employed to tailor action plans to the goals at hand. I also discuss how even a single action can induce sensorimotor binding, how intentionally implemented short-term associations between stimuli and responses become autonomous, how feature overlap between stimulus events and actions makes them compatible, and why action plans are necessarily incomplete.

The role of the Self in assessing doping cognition: Implicit and explicit measures of athletes’ doping-related prototype perceptions

ObjectivesTo examine athletes’ implicit and explicit prototype perceptions of performance enhancing substance (PES) users and non-users.DesignA cross-sectional mixed-method study.MethodsCompetitive athletes from 39 sports (N = 226; mean age = 27.66 ± 9.74 years; 59% male) completed four self-report questions and two Brief Implicit Association Tests online, assessing prototype favourability and similarity of PES users and non-users.ResultsAthletes explicitly associated themselves with a non-user (M = 3.13 ± 0.92) more than a PES user (M = 0.56 ± 0.88) and perceived a non-user (M = 89.92 ± 14.98) more favourably than a PES user (M = 13.18 ± 21.38). Indexing behaviour on self-reports, doping contemplators did not differ from ‘clean’ athletes in their perceptions of PES user prototypes while dopers perceived PES users favourably and similar to themselves. In comparison, doping contemplators paired the concept of 'dopers' easier with themselves than with others, while clean athletes and dopers had no preference for either pairing (D = −0.33, -0.08 and 0.01, respectively). All groups demonstrated some degree of preference for ‘good and doper’, moving from slight to moderate to strong preference in the groups of clean athletes, dopers and contemplators, respectively (D = −0.20, −0.37 and −0.80, respectively).ConclusionsResults suggest that doping contemplators may have a positive bias towards doping which is not endorsed in self-reports. Implicit preferences, along with the disparity between the implicit and explicit measures of athletes’ doping-related prototype perceptions advance understanding of doping behaviour and make a unique contribution to research methodology. Factors influencing the interplay between explicit and implicit endorsements of PES user prototypes warrant further research.     

Mechanisms for the object-based negative compatibility effect: voluntary versus involuntary inhibition

This study investigates whether the object-based negative compatibility effect (NCE) originates from involuntary or voluntary inhibition. We hypothesised that both supraliminally presented primes (the prime is a mug with its handle pointing either left or right) and experimental instructions (i.e., ignoring the prime) in previous studies might induce participants to develop a voluntarily inhibitory strategy that is responsible for the object-based NCE. To test this hypothesis, we conducted 3 experiments. Experiment 1 confirmed a suitable paradigm. Experiment 2 altered participants’ strategies by varying the frequency of compatible trials across blocks. The results revealed a significant NCE for the low-frequency condition, which suggested that voluntary strategy might be primarily responsible for the object-based NCE. Experiment 3 combined a free-choice target with an object-based NCE paradigm. The results showed equivalent frequencies and mean response times between the free-choice responses that corresponded to or were opposite from the orientations of the mug handle. Combined with the results of response time quartiles, which revealed NCEs in fast responses (Q1–Q3) but no compatibility effect in slow (Q4) responses, we concluded that the object-based NCE might be primarily based on voluntary inhibition. Moreover, this inhibition might take effect earlier than that of the arrow-based NCE.     

Stimulus–Response compatibility based on affective arousal

Participants responded by producing weak or strong forces to pictures that varied with respect to affective arousal and horizontal position. The task relevance of these stimulus dimensions was manipulated between different groups of participants, with Stimulus–Response mapping varying between blocks of trials. The combination of the respectively task-irrelevant stimulus features with responses varied unpredictably on a trial-to-trial basis. In addition, the valence of the pictures and the combination of valence with response force were varied. When affective arousal was task relevant, there was an advantage of the pairing arousing→strong, not arousing→weak over the reverse mapping. No such affectively-based compatibility effect emerged when arousal was task irrelevant. In addition, effects of arousal were modulated by valence, but only when arousal was the relevant stimulus dimension.     

The Development of a Simple Ballistic Skill with and Without Visual Control

80 randomly selected male Ss discriminated the “effort” required to perform a simple 1-handed ballistic aiming task: aligning a Fletcher’s Trolley with a pointer placed at varying distances adjacent to an inclined wooden track. Groups were aged 5-6, 10-11, 15-16, and 18 or more yr., with 10 Ss able to see both hands and target while the other 10 could see neither. A split-plot factorial design was used. On excluding the 5-6 yr.-old “Nonvision” children, the remaining 7 sub-groups were shown to be homogeneous. Mean absolute error scores increased with Distance, and also with a decrease in Age. In the “Non-vision” condition accuracy was reduced still further for all Ss. Age, Vision, and Distance and the interaction of Age with Vision were all significant, p<.01.     

An investigation of spatial representation of pitch in individuals with congenital amusia

Spatial representation of pitch plays a central role in auditory processing. However, it is unknown whether impaired auditory processing is associated with impaired pitch–space mapping. Experiment 1 examined spatial representation of pitch in individuals with congenital amusia using a stimulus–response compatibility (SRC) task. For amusic and non-amusic participants, pitch classification was faster and more accurate when correct responses involved a physical action that was spatially congruent with the pitch height of the stimulus than when it was incongruent. However, this spatial representation of pitch was not as stable in amusic individuals, revealed by slower response times when compared with control individuals. One explanation is that the SRC effect in amusics reflects a linguistic association, requiring additional time to link pitch height and spatial location. To test this possibility, Experiment 2 employed a colour-classification task. Participants judged colour while ignoring a concurrent pitch by pressing one of two response keys positioned vertically to be congruent or incongruent with the pitch. The association between pitch and space was found in both groups, with comparable response times in the two groups, suggesting that amusic individuals are only slower to respond to tasks involving explicit judgments of pitch.     

无掩蔽启动范式下负相容效应的时间进程

已有研究采用掩蔽启动范式证明了负相容效应的存在,但目前对于负相容效应的产生是否依赖于掩蔽刺激还存在激烈的争议。实验共32名大学生被试,采用12个选自汉语情感词语系统的汉字词语为材料,在显示屏刷新率为70HZ的无掩蔽启动范式下操纵启动与目标的时间间隔,让被试对目标词语的效价做出按键反应,记录被试对目标的反应时和错误率。本研究试图基于该时间进程下负相容效应发生的关键点来研究上述争议。结果发现：（1）无掩蔽范式下也存在负相容效应;（2）刺激呈现方式不同相容效应也不同。这表明负相容效应的产生并不依赖于掩蔽的呈现,且刺激的呈现方式对该效应有重要影响。     

Grasping the concept of personal property

The concept of property is integral to personal and societal development, yet understanding of the cognitive basis of ownership is limited. Objects are the most basic form of property, so our physical interactions with owned objects may elucidate nuanced aspects of ownership. We gave participants a coffee mug to decorate, use and keep. The experimenter also designed a mug of her own. In Experiment 1, participants performed natural lifting actions with each mug. Participants lifted the Experimenter’s mug with greater care, and moved it slightly more towards the Experimenter, while they lifted their own mug more forcefully and drew it closer to their own body. In Experiment 2, participants responded to stimuli presented on the mug handles in a computer-based stimulus–response compatibility task. Overall, participants were faster to respond in trials in which the handles were facing in the same direction as the response location compared to when the handles were facing away. The compatibility effect was abolished, however, for the Experimenter’s mug – as if the action system is blind to the potential for action towards another person’s property. These findings demonstrate that knowledge of the ownership status of objects influences visuomotor processing in subtle and revealing ways.     

反应-效应相容性范式下不同数字表征方式和身体经验对数字认知加工的影响

采用反应-效应相容性范式,探讨不同数字表征方式和身体经验对个体数字认知加工的影响。实验1首先采用木棒数字表征从知觉层面证明反应-效应相容性效应的存在;实验2采用累计手指数字表征考察手指数字表征在反应-效应相容性匹配中的优势;实验3则进一步排除了近似数量表征系统的影响,从语义层面探讨中国文化背景下语义概念手指数字表征的反应-效应相容性对数字认知加工的影响。结果发现,不同的数字表征系统中均存在反应-效应相容性效应,支持了观念运动理论;相比客体材料,手指数字表征在相容条件下具有明显的匹配优势,支持了具身数量的观点。