The Affect Misattribution in the Interpretation of Ambiguous Stimuli in Terms of Warmth vs. Competence: Behavioral Phenomenon and Its Neural Correlates

Abstract

Warmth and competence are fundamental dimensions of social cognition. This also applies to the interpretation of ambiguous symbolic stimuli in terms of their relation to warmth or competence. The affective state of an individual may affect the way people interpret the neutral stimuli in the environment. As previous findings have shown, it is possible to alter the perception of neutral social stimuli in terms of warmth vs. competence by eliciting an incidental affect with the use of emotion-laden words. In the current experiment, we expected the valence and origin of an affective state, factors ascribing emotionally laden words, to be able to switch the interpretation of the neutral objects. We have shown in behavioural results that negative valence and reflective origins promote the interpretation of unknown objects in terms of competence rather than warmth. Furthermore, electrophysiological-response-locked analyses revealed differences specific to negative valence while making the decision in the ambiguous task and while executing it. The results of the current experiment show that the usage of warmth and competence in social cognition is susceptible to affective state manipulation. In addition, the results are coherent with the evolutionary perspective on social cognition (valence effects) as well as with predictions of the dual mind model of emotion (origin effects).

Action-rule-based cognitive control enables efficient execution of stimulus–response conflict tasks: a model validation of Simon task performance

“…The cognitive processing for the Simon stimuli, regarded as general ambiguous stimuli, consists of two dissociable stages, i.e., orthographic and phonological processes: the former could capture congruency information, while the latter could capture contextual meaning, including the task goal. As in previous ERP studies addressing such ambiguity (Joos et al, 2020;Imbir et al, 2022), the former process provides the P200 reflecting congruency perception, while the latter provides the N200 reflecting emotional information, the P300 reflecting attentional processing onset, the N400 reflecting contextual processing, and the late positive potential (LPC) or P600 reflecting the profound meaning, including the task goal. Hence, we focused our attention on these ERP components.…”

“…Hence, we focused our attention on these ERP components. We set spatial and temporal regions of interest (ROIs) for identifying ERP components in accordance with previous studies ( Joos et al, 2020 ; Imbir et al, 2022 ). The vertex Cz electrode was selected ( Joos et al, 2020 ), and the time windows were set as follows: 150–275 ms (P200), 200–350 ms (N200), 300–400 ms (P300), 250–550 ms (N400), and 450–800 ms (LPC or P600).…”

More than just ambivalence: the perception of emotionally ambiguous words on the spaces of origin and activation indexed by behavioural and webcam-based eye-tracking correlates

“…Using word lists seems to be the most precise method to test various and reliable (because of the previously prepared affective norms) stimuli, but it is a method that might have reached its limits. In a recent study, the interactions between the three dimensions reached a maximum, which might be understood and interpreted (Imbir et al, 2022a). For this reason, deciding which spaces/dimensions to consider may be inevitable.…”

“…In previous research, automatic versus reflective emotions had different consequences on human decision-making (Walkowiak & Imbir, 2018); furthermore, the words rated as automatic or reflective had different influences on assessing social stimuli (Imbir, 2017b;Imbir et al, 2022a;Imbir & Pastwa, 2021) and controlling cognition (Imbir, 2017a;Imbir et al, 2022b). After splitting the bipolar dimension of origin into two unipolar dimensions of automaticity and reflectiveness, they negatively and moderately correlated with one another (r = À.50; Wielgopolan & Imbir, 2022).…”

“…In neuropsychological research, we have evidence that as soon as 100 ms after seeing a word stimulus we react differently to subsequent words varying in their valence and emotional arousal (Kissler et al, 2007; Scott et al, 2009). We notice emotions in response to words, we process them, and we might react to them differently (Fields & Kuperberg, 2012) and differently in response to different affective contexts (Imbir et al, 2022a; Imbir & Pastwa, 2021). For this reason, studying characteristics of words other than their valence may be of importance; in previous studies, some semantic attributes were proven to be ambiguous (e.g.…”