Contrast effects in spontaneous evaluations: A psychophysical account.

Abstract

In the affective-priming paradigm, target stimuli are preceded by evaluatively polarized prime stimuli and then are to be classified as either good or bad as fast as possible. The typical and robust finding is assimilation: Primes facilitate the processing of evaluatively consistent targets relative to evaluatively inconsistent targets. Nevertheless, contrast effects have repeatedly been observed. The authors propose a new psychophysical account of normal (assimilative) and reversed (contrastive) priming effects and test new predictions derived from it in 5 studies: In Studies 1 and 2, the authors' account is shown to provide a better explanation of contrastive effects in a priming paradigm with two primes than the traditional attentional account does. Furthermore, as predicted by the new account, contrast effects emerge at an intermediate stimulus-onset asynchrony (SOA, Study 3) and even with short SOAs when target onset takes participants by surprise (Study 4). Finally, the use of extremely valenced primes triggers corrective efforts (Study 5) as predicted. Implications for priming measures of evaluative associations are discussed.

Incongruency effects in affective processing: Automatic motivational counter-regulation or mismatch-induced salience?

“…What remains to be explained is the apparent discrepancy of the results of the second experiment with findings that were reported by Klauer (2007, 2009), Gawronski, Deutsch, and Seidel (2005), and Klauer et al (2003Klauer et al ( , 2009. In these studies, incongruent effects of a currently activated valence on the processing of valent stimuli were reported.…”

“…In spite of the evidence that was reported by Klauer et al (2003Klauer et al ( , 2009), Gawronski, Deutsch, and Seidel (2005), and Klauer (2007, 2009) regarding the effects of valence matches and mismatches on affective processing, a closer look at the recent literature on interactions between working memory and attention does not seem to yield strong support for incongruency effects between cognitive activation and attention. The prevailing finding in these studies is that holding a stimulus or a stimulus dimension active in working memory facilitates processing of this stimulus or stimulus dimension in an ongoing task and also leads to an automatic allocation of attention to the memorized stimulus if it is presented as a distractor in an ongoing task (Downing, 2000;Huang & Pashler, 2007;Lauwereyns, Wisnewski, Keown, & Govan, 2006;Lucas & Lauwereyns, 2007;Olivers, Meijer, & Theeuwes, 2006).…”

“…Although this difference in speed/accuracy tradeoffs invokes a confound between the two studies, we would like to point out that reducing accuracy motivation and increasing the motivation for speed in Experiment 1 actually works against the emergence of affective incongruency effects. Klauer et al (2009) have argued on the basis of their psychophysical account that increasing accuracy motivation should lead to a more exclusive form of processing that should enhance contrast effects (for related arguments linking accuracy motivation and contrast effects, see Fockenberg, Koole, & Semin, 2008;Wentura & Rothermund, 2003). The fact that we obtained contrast effects even in a situation in which accuracy was very low additionally supports a motivational explanation of the affective incongruency effect.…”

“…Since these hypotheses are purely cognitive in nature, they provide an alternative account of affective incongruency effects that is unrelated to motivational mechanisms. and Klauer (2007), Gawronski, Deutsch, and Seidel (2005, and by Klauer et al (2003Klauer et al ( , 2009) did not involve the manipulation of motivational variables, nor do the respective theories of mismatch-induced salience or affective blindness make an explicit reference to motivational states. In order to apply these purely cognitive explanations to the domain of motivational-affective incongruency effects, one has to assume that positive and negative motivational states (related to success/failure or to positively/negatively defined goal states)…”

Centre–surround inhibition is a general aspect of famous-person recognition: Evidence from negative semantic priming from clearly visible primes

“…This account was proposed by Klauer, Teige-Mocigemba, and Spruyt (2009) to account for contrast effects (conceptually similar to negative priming) in affective priming studies. According to this account, a "counter" records the rise in activation at a particular concept representation-for instance, there are counters for positive and for negative valence.…”