Scrutinizing the Emotional Nature of Intuitive Coherence Judgments

Dual‐system models propose that cognitive processing can occur either intuitively or deliberately. Unlike deliberate decision strategies, intuitive ones are assumed to have an emotional component attached to the decision process. We tested if intuitive decisions are indeed accompanied by an emotional response while deliberate decisions are not. Specifically, we conducted a psychophysiological study in which participants were instructed to decide either intuitively or deliberately if three simultaneously presented words were semantically coherent or incoherent (triad task). The degree of emotionality of these two decision strategies (intuitive vs. deliberate) was compared using changes in electrodermal activity (EDA) and the reaction time (RT) effect of an affective priming paradigm as primary measurements. Based on a valence‐arousal model, our results revealed that intuitive and deliberate judgments do not differ as to their emotional valence but that they do differ in emotional arousal. Most notably, sympathetic activation during intuitive judgments was significantly lower compared to sympathetic activation during deliberate judgments. Our results reflect that a relaxed state of mind—manifested in low sympathetic activity—could underlie the holistic processing that is assumed to facilitate the proliferation of semantic associations during coherence judgments. This suggests that coherence judgments made under an (instructed) intuitive decision mode have a specific psychophysiological signature and that arousal is the differentiating component between intuitive and deliberate decision strategies. © 2016 The Authors Journal of Behavioral Decision Making Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.     

An attention account of neural priming

Repetition priming of familiar stimuli (e.g., objects) produces a decrease in visual cortical activity for repeated versus novel items, which has been attributed to more fluent processing for repeated items. By contrast, priming of unfamiliar stimuli (e.g., abstract shapes) produces an increase in visual cortical activity. The mechanism for priming-related increases in activity for repeated unfamiliar stimuli is unknown. We hypothesised that such increases in activity may reflect attentional allocation to these items. We tested this hypothesis using a priming-spatial attention paradigm. During Phase 1 of Experiment 1, participants viewed unfamiliar abstract shapes and familiar objects. During Phase 2, participants identified target letters (S or H). Each target letter was preceded by a non-informative shape or object cue that was repeated (from Phase 1) or novel in the same (valid) or opposite (invalid) hemifield. In Experiment 2, we manipulated shape familiarity by presenting shapes once or six times during Phase 1. For both experiments, at valid locations, target identification accuracy was higher following repeated versus novel unfamiliar item cues and lower following repeated versus novel familiar item cues. These findings support our hypothesis that priming-related increases in visual cortical activity for repeated unfamiliar items may, in part, reflect attentional allocation.     

Invisible own- and other-race faces presented under continuous flash suppression produce affective response biases

One triumph of the human mind is the ability to place the multitudinous array of people we encounter into in- and out-group members based on racial characteristics. One fundamental question that remains to be answered is whether invisible own- and other-race faces can nevertheless influence subsequent affective judgments. Here, we employed continuous flash suppression (CFS) to render own- and other-race faces unperceivable in an affective priming task. Both on-line and off-line awareness checks were employed to provide more stringent control of partial awareness. Results revealed that relative to own-race faces, imperceptible other-race faces significantly facilitated participants’ identification of negative words, suggesting an other-race derogation bias. When faces were presented consciously, we found that not only other-race faces facilitated detection of negative words, but also own-race faces facilitated detection of positive words. These findings together provide novel and strong evidence suggesting that invisible racial faces can bias affective responses.     

双语即时切换下非目标语言语音和语义的激活状态

本研究采用双语即时切换范式, 探讨非熟练中英双语者在对目标语言(启动词)语音或语义的加工过程中非目标语言的激活状态。实验1设置了与启动词的翻译对等词存在语音相关或无关的两类配对词, 要求被试进行语音判断任务, 结果表明, 不论哪种切换条件, 两类配对词在反应时和P200成分上都没有差异, 说明目标语言在语音加工过程中非目标语言的语音层面没有得到自动激活, 从而没有产生启动效应。实验2则设置了语义相关和无关配对词, 并进行语义判断任务, 结果在两种切换条件下都发现明显的语义启动效应及N400差异, 说明非目标语言在语义层面上有得到自动激活, 但激活的程度表现出切换方向上的不一致, L1-L2切换下的语义启动量要明显大于L2-L1, 并且L1-L2的N400差异主要表现在前部脑区, 持续时间更久, 而L2-L1的N400差异主要表现在后部脑区, 但持续时间较短, 表明对于非熟练的双语者来说, 不同切换方向下对共享语义表征的激活加工是不一样的。     

中文词汇加工中的饱和现象

长时间注视一个字或词语后,感觉这个字词变得奇怪且陌生,这种现象称为饱和现象。本研究采用快速类别/词汇匹配范式,考察中文词汇加工中的饱和现象。实验1-3发现单纯的语义或字形的重复均未能引发饱和,只有类别标签在字形和语义上的同时重复才引发饱和,表明与英文饱和相似,中文饱和发生在字形加工和语义加工的联结阶段。实验4结果表明,中文饱和还能够由表义部件的重复引发,体现了中文饱和的特殊性。     

阅读中的快速启动范式述评

快速启动范式（Sereno & Rayner, 1992）是一种基于呈现随眼动变化技术而设计的眼动范式,主要用于研究中央凹视野内字词识别的瞬时启动,通过精确控制启动条件和启动时窗,以考察词汇通达过程中词汇水平（如,词频、词长等）、亚词汇水平（如,语音、语义、字形等）信息的加工时序。本文从基本原理、设计基础、应用领域、注意事项等方面对快速启动范式进行了较为深入的解读和介绍,并结合已有的研究成果,指出了该范式在汉语阅读中的应用价值。     

任务与字频对汉字情绪启动反转效应的影响

本研究使用ERP技术对比了效价判断与真假字判断两种任务形式下的汉字情绪启动效应。结果发现,在效价判断任务中高频目标字出现情绪启动的反转效应,效价不一致比一致条件下反应时短,诱发了较大的P200;低频目标字出现情绪启动的一致性效应,效价一致比不一致条件下反应时短,诱发了较大的P200与N400。真假字判断任务中高频和低频目标字均出现情绪启动的一致性效应。情绪启动的反转效应依赖于刺激材料的可通达性与注意导向,启动字与目标字的反应竞争关系导致了情绪启动的反转效应。     

不同SOA条件下的情感启动效应研究

在150ms和250ms两种SOA条件下,以彩色图片为启动刺激,以汉语双字词为目标刺激,通过评价分类任务考察情感启动效应。结果表明在两种SOA条件下均存在显著的情感启动效应;积极启动和消极启动对目标词产生了不同的影响。类似Stroop效应的反应冲突机制可解释本研究所获得的结果。     

On the masking and disclosure of unconscious elaborate processing. A reply to Van Opstal, Reynvoet, and Verguts (2005)

We have recently argued that unconscious numerical stimuli might activate responses by a match with prespecified action trigger codes (action trigger account) rather than by semantic prime processing (elaborate processing account). [Van Opstal, F., Reynvoet, B., and Verguts, T. (2005). How to trigger elaborate processing? A comment on Kunde, Kiesel, and Hoffmann (2003). Cognition] replicate one piece of evidence for our inference—an inefficiency of primes not presented in target format (verbal or Arabic). But this was found only with letter masks and not with hash masks. The authors conclude that letter masks block unconscious prime processing, and that elaborate processing can account for unconscious priming effects if all its (sometimes subtle) side conditions are considered. We agree that the type of mask in general is an important factor in priming studies but we note that (i) the authors' mask-blocking hypothesis is not well supported by the data, (ii) clear evidence for semantic prime processing in their study is lacking and, (iii) differences in mask efficiency (rather than mask type) might account for the conflicting results. To corroborate this inference we replicate van Opstal et al.'s results with letter masks but reduced mask efficiency. Altogether their data do not challenge the action-trigger account nor do they strongly support the elaborate processing view.     

情绪启动与语义启动的比较

情绪启动与语义启动发生时孰先孰后、进行中独立平行还是交互作用、效应上孰强孰弱,还存在较大争议.这些争议的本质涉及到人脑中情绪和认知这两大基本系统的关系认识问题.通过行为观察与事件相关脑电位技术结合,在同一个实验中设置情绪启动、语义启动两种情境,并匹配可能影响这两种启动效应的因素,如信息强度、启动刺激和靶刺激的信息关联程度等,然后系统性变化启动刺激呈现的时间、SOA、实验任务等,并逐步加入被试的年龄、性别、学科专业、认知风格、情绪易感性等个体差异变量,可望直接而系统地澄清争议,深层次揭示情绪信息流与语义信息流的加工特点,并进而揭示人脑情绪系统与认知系统功能与机制的发展规律.