Cognitive structure and receptivity to low intensity stimulation.

Abstract

In order to investigate the role of prior cognitive organization on receptivity to minimal stimulation, 2 cognitive structures of Ss' initial impressions of a neutral face were created. Then Ss redescribed their impressions of the constantly visible neutral face while 2 additional faces, 1 Happy and 1 Sad, were superimposed below Ss' detection threshold. The results showed that a cognitive structure in which the elements are relatively undifferentiated and nonlogically related significantly facilitates the influence of minimal stimuli. When Ss' initial impressions were organized into a more differentiated, logical structure, however, minimal stimuli tended not to be incorporated. The major findings are consistent with psychoanalytic notions about the role of primary and secondary thought processes and sensitivity to minimal stimulation.Concepts of cognitive structures and their role in mediating stimulus input have been of particular interest to various experimenters in recent years. Festinger (19S7) and Zajonc (19SS, 1960) have attempted to specify the effects of cognitive organization on attitude formation and interpersonal communication. In addition, Rokeach's (1960) studies of open and closed belief-disbelief systems and Leventhal's (1962) study of interpersonal impression formation have reflected an interest in the effects of structural variables on the response to and evaluation of new information.These studies suggest that cognitive organizations which are more flexible, more complex, and permit the assimiliation of disparate, undifferentiated, global experience tend to be associated with a greater degree of sensitivity to and a greater capacity to evaluate new stimulus input, or information, 1 This study is based on a dissertation submitted to the faculty of the Graduate School of Yale University in candidacy for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. The study was carried out while the author was a predoctoral United States Public Health Service trainee in clinical psychology. 2 The author is especially grateful to Sidney I. Perloe, Chairman of the Dissertation Committee, for his support and advice during all phases of this study. Fred D. Sheffield and Leonard W. Doob offered many valuable suggestions.In addition, thanks go to Cynthia M. Wild and Richard R. Waite for ranking the responses, to Cynthia Fox Dember for having made her stimuli available and for having shared her ideas with the author.

Subliminal Perception and Cognitive Style in a Concept Learning Task Taught via Television

“…Yet Allison (1963) found that people who were characterized as holistic and global (similar to field dependents) were more susceptible to subliminal messages than people who were analytic and active (similar to field independents). It may be that field dependents are not attending to specific parts of the visual field, but rather to the whole, and thus have a lower perceptual threshold.…”

“…Because field independents are more capable of consciously discerning parts of a complex visual field, while field dependents have difficulty with that task and are more likely to perceive the visual field as a whole, it would seem that field independents could discern subliminal messages better than field dependents. Yet Allison (1963) found that people who were characterized as holistic and global (similar to field dependents) were more susceptible to subliminal messages than people who were analytic and active (similar to field independents). It may be that field dependents are not attending to specific parts of the visual field, but rather to the whole, and thus have a lower perceptual threshold.…”

Consciousness and Self-Regulation

“…Although it is likely that the left hemisphere, for most people, is more susceptible to subliminal perception of verbal stimuli and the right hemisphere is more likely to process spatial stimuli out of awareness (Henley and Dixon, 1974), individual differences in overall susceptibility to subliminal perception have also been observed. Allison (1963) found that when pictorial stimuli were used, subliminal effects were found only when subjects were encouraged to use cognitive sets that were intuitive and holistic in emphasis. When subjects were encouraged to employ cognitive sets that were logical and analytic in emphasis, subliminal effects could not be found.…”

Body sensation and perception of projective stimuli.

“…In short, the possibility exists that patterns of body sensation (whether they relate to one's shape, size, boundedness, or muscle tensions) may become sufficiently prominent to impose themselves as frames of reference upon unstructured perceptual fields. The fact that "background" information can influence perception in this fashion is well documented by the work of Klein, Spence, Holt, and Gourevitch (1958), Eagle (1959), andAllison (1963). Even more directly, Fisher (1964) was recently able to show a positive relationship between degree of awareness of one's own body and selective superiority in the learning and recall of words having body reference as compared to words with nonbody meaning.…”