No abstract

Dropping bowling balls on tomatoes: representations of object state-changes during sentence processing.

This work examines the influence of stored conceptual knowledge (i.e., schema and item-typicality) on conscious memory processes. Specifically, we tested whether item-typicality selectively modulates recollection and familiarity-based memories as a function of the availability of a categorical schema during encoding. Experiment 1 manipulated both encoding type (categorical vs. perceptual) and item-typicality (typical vs. atypical) in a single Remember-Know paradigm. Experiment 2 replicated and extended the previous study with a complementary source-memory task. In both experiments, we observed that typical items led to more Guess responses, while atypical items led to more Remember responses. These findings support the idea that the activation of a congruent categorical schema selectively enhances familiarity-based memories, likely due to the bypassing of the activated mechanisms for novel information. In contrast, atypical items improved recollective-based memories only, suggesting that their lesser fit with the stored prototype might have triggered those novelty processing mechanisms. Moreover, atypical items enhanced memory in the categorical condition for both item recognition and recollection memories only, suggesting an episodic gain due to inconsistency/novelty. The source memory results gave further credence to the argument that "Remember" judgments were based on truly recollective experiences and presented the same interaction between encoding type and item-typicality observed in recollective-based memories. Overall, the results suggest that the supposedly opposite conceptual knowledge effects actually coexist and interact, albeit selectively, in the modulation of recollection and familiarity processes.

The current research considered the question of how performing an action, or merely preparing the body for action, can have an impact on social judgments related to person perception. Participants were asked to ascribe competence and warmth characteristics to a target person by reading a metaphoric text while their body was manipulated to be prepared for the processing of action-congruent information. In Experiment 1, participants whose forward body action matched the metaphoric action described in the text ascribed more competence characteristics to a politician than did control participants. In Experiment 2, participants whose body was merely prepared for forward movement also ascribed more competence characteristics to a politician than did control participants. In addition, the data from Experiment 2 ruled out an alternative non-embodied explanation (i.e., that effect is due to basic associative processes) grounded in the existing literatures on attitudes by demonstrating that body manipulation had no effect on competence when a non-metaphoric text was used. Finally, no evidence was found that body manipulation affects warmth judgments. These studies converge in demonstrating that forward body movements enhance the favorability of competence judgments when these match the metaphoric forward movements described by text.