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A cue from the unconscious - masked symbols prompt spatial anticipation

Please always quote using this URN: urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-123971
  • Anticipating where an event will occur enables us to instantaneously respond to events that occur at the expected location. Here we investigated if such spatial anticipations can be triggered by symbolic information that participants cannot consciously see. In two experiments involving a Posner cueing task and a visual search task, a central cue informed participants about the likely location of the next target stimulus. In half of the trials, this cue was rendered invisible by pattern masking. In both experiments, visible cues led to cueingAnticipating where an event will occur enables us to instantaneously respond to events that occur at the expected location. Here we investigated if such spatial anticipations can be triggered by symbolic information that participants cannot consciously see. In two experiments involving a Posner cueing task and a visual search task, a central cue informed participants about the likely location of the next target stimulus. In half of the trials, this cue was rendered invisible by pattern masking. In both experiments, visible cues led to cueing effects, that is, faster responses after valid compared to invalid cues. Importantly, even masked cues caused cueing effects, though to a lesser extent. Additionally, we analyzed effects on attention that persist from one trial to the subsequent trial. We found that spatial anticipations are able to interfere with newly formed spatial anticipations and influence orienting of attention in the subsequent trial. When the preceding cue was visible, the corresponding spatial anticipation persisted to an extent that prevented a noticeable effect of masked cues. The effects of visible cues were likewise modulated by previous spatial anticipations, but were strong enough to also exert an impact on attention themselves. Altogether, the results suggest that spatial anticipations can be formed on the basis of unconscious stimuli, but that interfering influences like still active spatial anticipations can suppress this effect.show moreshow less

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Metadaten
Author: Heiko Reuss, Andrea Kiesel, Wilfried Kunde, Peter Wühr
URN:urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-123971
Document Type:Journal article
Faculties:Fakultät für Humanwissenschaften (Philos., Psycho., Erziehungs- u. Gesell.-Wissensch.) / Institut für Psychologie
Language:English
Parent Title (English):Frontiers in Psychology
Year of Completion:2012
Volume:3
Pagenumber:397
Source:Frontiers in Psychology 3:397. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00397
Pubmed Id:https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/PMC3470269
Dewey Decimal Classification:1 Philosophie und Psychologie / 15 Psychologie / 150 Psychologie
Tag:anticipation; endogenous shifts of attention; masked priming; spatial cueing; unconscious processing
Release Date:2016/01/12
Licence (German):License LogoCC BY: Creative-Commons-Lizenz: Namensnennung