Priming

Abstract

This chapter is about the wide variety of priming encountered in cognitive and social psychology. In cognitive psychology, the priming paradigm is mainly used to study memory phenomena or the pre-activation of concepts and motor reactions by related stimuli. In social psychology, the term priming is used for a broader range of phenomena in which an event triggers a subsequent behavior. In this chapter, some definitions of priming and the origin of the term's use in psychology are presented. Then, the chapter examines different types and variants of priming as well as their features and principal elements, using seven organizing principles. After this methodical and empirical classification, some important theories of response priming, semantic priming, affective/evaluative priming, negative priming, and macro-level priming are summarized. Last but not least, some general questions and problems in priming research are outlined and a brief outlook is given.