Hostname: page-component-6bf8c574d5-9nwgx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-14T18:42:34.196Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Extremely rigorous subliminal paradigms demonstrate unconscious influences on simple decisions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 January 2014

Michael Snodgrass ,
Howard Shevrin  and
James A. Abelson
Michael Snodgrass
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of Michigan Medical Center, Ann Arbor, MI 48105. jmsnodgr@med.umich.edushevrin@med.umich.edujabelson@med.umich.edu
Howard Shevrin
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of Michigan Medical Center, Ann Arbor, MI 48105. jmsnodgr@med.umich.edushevrin@med.umich.edujabelson@med.umich.edu
James A. Abelson
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of Michigan Medical Center, Ann Arbor, MI 48105. jmsnodgr@med.umich.edushevrin@med.umich.edujabelson@med.umich.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

While showing unconscious influences on complex decisions is indeed difficult, relevant awareness in relatively simpler subliminal paradigms is more easily assessed. Utilizing objective detection (vs. more typical identification or classification) tasks to assess awareness overcomes longstanding residual methodological problems, and prior work using such methods (e.g., Snodgrass & Shevrin 2006) clearly shows unconscious influences on simple decisions.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 37 , Issue 1 , February 2014 , pp. 39 - 40
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Debner, J. & Jacoby, L. L. (1994) Unconscious perception: Attention, awareness, and control. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition 20:304–17.Google Scholar
Fisk, G. D. & Haase, S. (2011) The relationship between the objective identification threshold and priming effects does not provide a definitive boundary between conscious and unconscious perceptual processes. Consciousness and Cognition 20:1221–31.Google Scholar
Green, D. M. & Swets, J. A. (1966) Signal detection theory and psychophysics, vol. 1974. Wiley.Google Scholar
Jacoby, L. L. (1991) A process dissociation framework: Separating automatic from intentional uses of memory. Journal of Memory and Language 30:513–41.Google Scholar
Lovibond, P. F. & Shanks, D. R. (2002) The role of awareness in Pavlovian conditioning: Empirical evidence and theoretical implications. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes 28:3–26.Google Scholar
Macmillan, N. (1986) The psychophysics of subliminal perception. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 9:38–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pratte, M. S. & Rouder, J. N. (2009) A task-difficulty artifact in subliminal priming. Attention, Perception & Psychophysics 71(6):1276–83.Google Scholar
Snodgrass, M., Bernat, E. & Shevrin, H. (2004a) Unconscious perception: A model-based approach to method and evidence. Perception & Psychophysics 66:846–67.Google Scholar
Snodgrass, M., Bernat, E. & Shevrin, H. (2004b) Unconscious perception at the objective detection threshold exists. Perception & Psychophysics 66 888–95.Google Scholar
Snodgrass, M. & Shevrin, H. (2006) Unconscious inhibition and facilitation at the objective detection threshold: Replicable and qualitatively different unconscious perceptual effects. Cognition 101:43–79.Google Scholar
Snodgrass, M., Shevrin, H., & Kopka, M. (1993a) The mediation of intentional judgments by unconscious perceptions: The influences of task strategy, task preference, word meaning, and motivation. Consciousness and Cognition 2:169–93.Google Scholar
Snodgrass, M., Shevrin, H., & Kopka, M. (1993b) Absolute inhibition is incompatible with conscious perception. Consciousness and Cognition 2:204–209.Google Scholar
van Gaal, S., de Lange, F. & Cohen, M. (2012) The role of consciousness in cognitive control and decision making. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience 6:121. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2012.00121.Google Scholar
Van Selst, M. & Merikle, P. M. (1993) Perception below the objective threshold? Consciousness and Cognition 2:194–203.Google Scholar
Wong, P., Bernat, E., Snodgrass, M. & Shevrin, H. (2004) Event-related brain correlates of associative learning without awareness. International Journal of Psychophysiology 53:217–31.Google Scholar