Effects of agreement and disagreement in groups on recognition memory performance and confidence

Three dependent variables, derived from an extended Signal-Detection paradigma, were used in each of 3 experiments: memory performance, confidence-level, and response-bias. Each memory item was first judged by S and then fictitiously by 2 confederates providing different degrees of agreement and disagreement. As compared to agreement moderate disagreement yielded both better recognition performance and, if S's judgements were false, less confidence. Strong disagreement failed to repeat these findings. Balanced agreement/disagreement raised the level of both performance and confidence relative to a situation without information from the group. In all the experiments correct decisions yielded higher confidence than errors. Festinger's theory of social comparison processes accounts for all results in performance, but for explaining the confidence shifts assumptions on ‘internal cues’ should also be incorporated. The response-bias was not affected by social treatment differences, thus supporting the view of some Signal-Detection theorists. Proposals towards a general theory of stimulus processing in social context are outlined and some of its consequences are discussed by taking as examples some conformity experiments.     

Construction and complexity of tactual maps for the blind

Summary In this investigation, the effectiveness of tactual maps for the blind was tested. Four different pseudomaps were constructed; they differ on the one hand in type of construction (channel vs. track construction) and on the other hand in degree of complexity (low vs. high complexity).Depending on the experimental condition, blindfolded sighted Ss had to learn one of the four maps (10 Ss for each type). Afterwards they had to reproduce the maps by drawing them. The accuracy of their performance was measured in two different ways (free reproduction and reproduction with correction). In addition, the memory and spatial imagery of the Ss were measured by two psychological tests.The overall result of the study was that reproduction is better for tactual maps with channels than with tracks. This result is valid for maps with low as well as high complexity. Furthermore, maps with channels are more widely usable, since with this type of map, good memory and spatial imagery are not prerequisites.     

Feature binding contributions to effect monitoring

Monitoring the perceptual effects of body movements is supposed to be a capacity-limited process that can interfere with processing of a concurrent task. Here we studied the contribution of feature binding to such effect monitoring interference. In three experiments, we varied the possibility of feature overlap between responses and effects in a primary task and responses in a secondary task. We show that responses in a secondary task are delayed when they partially, rather than completely, alternate or repeat features of responses/effects of a primary task. Yet, these partial feature repetition/alternation costs are small, and they occur on top of other factors that lengthen the critical effect monitoring process, such as the spatial compatibility of responses and effects in the primary task. The results thus show that feature binding contributes to, but cannot fully account for, delays in a secondary task caused by monitoring effects of a primary task.

     

Goal congruency in bimanual object manipulation

In 3 experiments, the authors investigated the impact of action goals on the production of discrete bimanual responses. Similar to a bartender putting 2 glasses simultaneously on a shelf, participants placed 2 objects into either parallel or opposite orientations by carrying out either mirror-symmetrical or mirror-asymmetrical movements. In Experiment 1, performance was strongly affected by the congruency of the intended object orientations but was essentially unaffected by movement symmetry. Experiment 2 replicated this instrumental goal-congruency effect (and the absence of motor-symmetry effects) when actions were cued in advance. Experiment 3 revealed substantial motor-symmetry effects, provided the movements themselves became the action goal. The authors concluded that performance in bimanual choice reaction tasks is constrained by the creation and maintenance of goal codes rather than by properties inherent in the neuromuscular system that carries out these responses. These goals can relate to either body-intrinsic states or to body-extrinsic states according to the actor's current intentions.     

Response priming by supraliminal and subliminal action effects

Theories assuming an effect-based coding of action predict that motor responses become activated by the perception of the responses' sensory effects. In accordance with this prediction it was found that responding to a visual target is faster and more accurate when the target is briefly preceded by the visual effect of the required response. Most importantly, this effect-induced response priming was independent of prime perceptibility and it occurred even when the prime was not consciously discriminable. Beyond ruling out alternative interpretations of earlier induction studies in terms of deliberate response biases, this suggests that effect codes evoke their associated motor patterns in a highly automatic manner not affording conscious mediation. The results accord with a functional dissociation between the consciousness-mediated implementation and the consciousness-independent realization of action goals.     

Actions blind to conceptually overlapping stimuli

Participants are worse at identifying spatial symbols (arrowheads) while performing spatially compatible manual key presses. The present experiments investigated the generality of this blindness effect to response-compatible stimuli. In Experiment 1 a left key press deteriorated the identification of left-pointing arrows, and a right key press deteriorated the perception of right-pointing arrows, independent of the hands used to press the key. Thus the blindness effect is based on codes of the distal response location rather than on the body-intrinsic anatomical connection of the hands. Experiment 2 extended the blindness effect to verbal responses and written position words (left, right, up, down). Vocalizing a position word blinded to directly compatible position words (e.g., left-left), but not to orthogonally compatible position words (e.g., left-down). This result suggests that the use of identical stimulus-response codes, and not the use of saliency-matching but distinct codes, suffices to produce blindness effects. Finally, Experiment 3 extended the blindness phenomenon beyond the spatial domain by demonstrating blindness between saying color words and perceiving color patches. Altogether, the experiments revealed action-induced blindness to be a phenomenon of broad empirical validity occurring whenever action and perception afford simultaneous access to the same conceptual codes.     

Adaptation to (non)valent task disturbance

The cognitive system adapts to disturbances caused by task-irrelevant information. For example, interference due to irrelevant spatial stimulation (e.g., the spatial Simon effect) typically diminishes right after a spatially incongruent event. These adaptation effects reflect processes that help to overcome the impact of task-irrelevant information. Interference with (or interruption of) task processing can also result from valent (i.e., positive or negative) stimuli, such as in the ??affective Simon?? task. In the present study, we tested whether the resolution of valence-based task disturbances generalizes to the resolution of other cognitive (spatial) types of interference, and vice versa. Experiments 1 and 2 explored the interplay of adaptation effects triggered by spatial and affective interference. Incongruent spatial information modified the spatial Simon effect but not affective interference effects, whereas incongruent affective information modified affective interference effects to some extent, but not spatial Simon effects. In Experiment 3, we investigated the interplay of adaptation effects triggered by spatial interference and by the interruption of task processing from valent information that did not overlap with the main task (??emotional Stroop?? effect). Again we observed domain-specific adaptation for the spatial Simon effect but found no evidence for cross-domain modulations. We assume that the processes used to resolve task disturbance from irrelevant affective and spatial information operate in largely independent manners.     

The locus of tool-transformation costs

Transformations of hand movements by tools such as levers or electronic input devices can invoke performance costs compared to untransformed movements. This study investigated by means of the Psychological Refractory Period (PRP) paradigm at which stage of information processing such tool-transformation costs arise. We used an inversion transformation, that is, the movement of the operating hand was transformed into a spatially incompatible movement of a lever. As a basic tool-transformation effect, the initiation of inverted tool movements was delayed compared to noninverted movements. Experiment 1 suggested a central (or postcentral) locus of this tool-transformation effect and ruled out a (precentral) perceptual locus. Experiments 2 and 3 confirmed the central locus and ruled out a later, motor-related stage of processing. The results show that spatially incompatible tool movements delay a capacity-limited stage of information processing, often referred to as response selection.     

Behandlungs- und Kunstfehler in der Psychoanalyse

Failures and transgressions in psychoanalyses are nowadays more often published and also ascribed to mistakes made by the therapists. In German professional literature, however, no difference is made between treatment errors due to the special method and serious malpractice. The authors show in case studies transgressions in the psychoanalytic setting und discuss their causes and consequences.     

Perceiving by proxy: Effect-based action control with unperceivable effects

Anticipations of future sensory events have the potential of priming motor actions that would typically cause these events. Such effect anticipations are generally assumed to rely on previous physical experiences of the contingency of own actions and their ensuing effects. Here we propose that merely imagined action effects may influence behaviour similarly as physically experienced action effects do. Three experiments in the response–effect compatibility paradigm show that the mere knowledge of action–effect contingencies is indeed sufficient to incorporate these effects into action control even if the effects are never experienced as causally linked to own actions. The experiments further highlight constraints for this mechanism which seems to be rather effortful and to depend on explicit intentions.