Abstract
Subliminal perception occurs when prime stimuli that participants claim not to be aware of nevertheless influence subsequent processing of a target. This claim, however, critically depends on correct methods to assess prime awareness. Typically, d′ (“d prime”) tasks administered after a priming task are used to establish that people are unable to discriminate between different primes. Here, we show that such d′ tasks are influenced by the nature of the target, by attentional factors, and by the delay between stimulus presentation and response. Our results suggest that the standard d′ task is not a straightforward measure of prime visibility. We discuss the implications of our findings for subliminal perception research.
Highlights
While the existence of unconscious perception is endorsed by many authors (e.g. [1]), there is continuing debate about the extent of its influence (e.g., [2]–[6])
A dissociation logic is applied: if primes exert an indirect influence on participants behavior, but fail to reach awareness in a direct d9 test, one can argue that primes were unconsciously processed during the priming task
reaction times (RTs) are slower for incongruent than for congruent trials, with the difference increasing with increasing SOAs
Summary
While the existence of unconscious perception is endorsed by many authors (e.g. [1]), there is continuing debate about the extent of its influence (e.g., [2]–[6]). Subliminal perception research resorted to asking participants whether they could see the shortly presented stimuli or not Such subjective methods, soon attracted considerable criticism [7], of which the most important was their lack of sensitivity: Participants are likely to fail to report conscious contents when they lack confidence in their perceptual judgements (‘‘the underconfidence phenomenon’’, e.g., [8]). Soon attracted considerable criticism [7], of which the most important was their lack of sensitivity: Participants are likely to fail to report conscious contents when they lack confidence in their perceptual judgements (‘‘the underconfidence phenomenon’’, e.g., [8]) In this and other fields (e.g., implicit learning research, see [9]), researchers began preferring objective measures such as participants’ ability to choose amongst several alternatives which stimulus they have been exposed to subliminally. A dissociation logic is applied: if primes exert an indirect influence on participants behavior (mostly shown by reaction times in an indirect task), but fail to reach awareness in a direct d9 test, one can argue that primes were unconsciously processed during the priming task
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