You Can’t See Much in the Dark

Abstract

This article investigates the interplay between darkness, construal level, and psychological distance based on the link between environmental lighting conditions and visual perception. In the dark, visual perception becomes less focused and detailed, leading to more abstract representations. We argue that this link between physical darkness and a global perceptual processing style spills over to the conceptual level. In three experiments, darkness triggered a more global perceptual and conceptual processing style than did brightness, regardless of whether the darkness was physically manipulated or primed. Additionally, two Implicit Association Tests (IATs) showed that darkness is more strongly associated with high-level construal than with low-level construal. Moreover, drawing on the generalized link between construal level and psychological distance, we proposed that darkness is also linked to perceived psychological distance because the lack of detail information and the abstract representations in the dark remove objects and other persons from people’s direct, detailed experience. Eight IATs confirmed the implicit link between darkness and four dimensions of psychological distance. These implications of these results are discussed with regard to thinking styles and social processes like stereotyping and cooperation.

In the spotlight: Brightness increases self-awareness and reflective self-regulation

“…public self-awareness) and corresponding controlled behavior. Importantly, due to the transfer of these links between the perceptual and conceptual level (Steidle et al, 2011) and their automaticity, the effects may emerge independent of the perception of brightness differences and outside of people's conscious awareness. In sum, the present results show the importance of these accounts to explain the full range of lighting effects on human functioning and behavior.…”

“…Research on lightinduced disinhibition (e.g., Gergen et al, 1973;Zhong et al, 2010) can answer the question whether perceptual brightness affects actual behavior, but it will be a question for future research to determine whether priming brightness increases behavioral selfcontrol. Based on the previous research showing parallel effects of perceptual and conceptual brightness (Steidle et al, 2011, we would assume that there are no differences.…”

“…Based on our assumption that the link between brightness and self-regulatory processes is welllearned and rather automatic, perceptual and conceptual brightness should lead to similar effects. Previous studies investigating the associations between brightness and cognitive procedures (Steidle, Werth, & Hanke, 2011) and between brightness and cooperation showed parallel effects for perceptual variations of brightness (lighting conditions, wearing sunglasses) and conceptual variations of brightness (priming). Hence, to control for lighting effects on visibility and alertness, brightness and darkness were induced via priming methods.…”

“…First, participants indicated their age, gender, and smoking status (smoker vs. non-smoker). To subtly manipulate brightness, we used a priming task (Steidle et al, 2011). Participants were asked to recall a situation in which they were at a bright (dark) location.…”

In The Dark We Cooperate: The Situated Nature of Procedural Embodiment

“…Recent research has shown than not only concepts but also procedures can be embodied (Förster & Denzler, 2012). For instance, darkness is linked with abstract processing and a high construal level (Steidle, Werth, & Hanke, 2011). This association counts among the procedural embodiment phenomena (Förster & Denzler, 2012) because, here, a concrete entity "darkness" is associated with a procedure "abstract processing" and not with a content.…”