Implicit Association Test Effect Research Articles

Explicit and implicit effects of gaming content on social media on the behavior of young adults.

Excessive gameplay can have negative effects on both mental and physical health, especially among young people. Nowadays, social media platforms are bombarding users with gaming-related content daily. Understanding the effect of this content on people's behavior is essential to gain insight into problematic gaming habits. However, this issue is yet to be studied extensively. In this study, we examined how gaming-related content on social media affects young adults explicitly and implicitly. We studied 25 healthy young adults (average age 21.5 ± 2.2) who played online games casually and asked them to report their gaming desire. We also conducted an implicit association test (IAT) to measure their implicit attitudes toward gaming-related content. We also investigated the relationship between these measures and various psychological factors, such as personality traits, self-efficacy, impulsiveness, and cognitive flexibility. The results revealed that participants had a higher explicit gaming desire when exposed to gaming-related cues on social media than neutral cues. They also had a robust positive implicit attitude toward gaming-related content on social media. Explicit gaming desire was positively correlated with neuroticism levels. Furthermore, the IAT effect was negatively correlated with self-efficacy and cognitive flexibility levels. However, there were no significant correlations between explicit gaming desire/IAT effect and impulsiveness levels. These findings suggest that gaming-related content on social media can affect young adults' behavior both explicitly and implicitly, highlighting the need for further research to prevent gaming addiction in vulnerable individuals.

Trust in virtual ingroup or outgroup members relies on perceived self-other overlap.

Why do we trust each other? We carried out three experiments to test whether interpersonal trust depends on perceived self-other overlap. As previous studies suggest that enfacing (feeling ownership for, and include more into oneself of the face of) an avatar might make one trust this avatar more, we exposed participants to faces of ingroup and outgroup avatars that moved in synchrony or out of synchrony with the participant's own facial movements, and assessed the impact of synchrony on self-other overlap and trust measures. Experiment 1 used ingroup faces and successfully showed that synchrony (manipulated within-participants) increased self-other overlap and trust, which we assessed by means of the Trust Game and the Implicit Association Test (IAT). In Experiment 2, which used outgroup faces and a within-participants design, synchrony still increased scores in the Trust Game but the IAT was no longer affected. Experiment 3 replicated Experiment 2 but with synchrony varying between participants, which eliminated the synchrony effect in both trust measures. Importantly, Inclusion of Other in the Self (IOS) ratings were found to predict the IAT effect in synchronous conditions. Taken altogether, our findings suggest that interpersonal trust is mainly driven by perceived self-other overlap. Besides group identification, appearance, and voluntary movement, synchrony is just one of several sources contributing to perceived self-other overlap.

The Role of Causal Attributions in Observational Conditioning

Our behavior towards a stimulus can change as a result of observing a regularity between that stimulus and someone else’s emotional reaction, a type of social learning referred to as observational conditioning. We explore the idea that causal attributions (i.e., the extent to which the observer attributes the model’s reaction to the stimulus) play an important role in observational conditioning effects. In three experiments (total N = 665), participants watched videos in which one cookie was followed by a positive reaction and another cookie was followed by a negative reaction, after which their own evaluations of each cookie were measured via self-reports and an implicit association test (IAT). Critically, we manipulated whether the observed reactions were high or low in terms of distinctiveness (Experiments 1a and 1b) or consensus and consistency (Experiment 2). These three variables are known to influence stimulus attributions and were therefore predicted to moderate observational conditioning effects. In line with our predictions, high distinctiveness (Experiments 1a and 1b) and high consensus and consistency (Experiment 2) both resulted in larger observational conditioning effects, with one exception: high distinctiveness did not lead to larger changes in automatic evaluations (i.e., IAT effects). Taken together, our findings suggest that causal attributions play an important role in observational conditioning. We outline more elaborate analyses of the attributional processes that are involved and suggest potential future directions for research on observational conditioning.

Why Does the IAT Reveal a Preference for Stimuli Said to Be Paired With an Unpleasant Sound? Stalking the Unexpected

The Implicit Association Test (IAT) is the most widely used measure to assess automatic evaluations. One classic phenomenon that has been well established both using the IAT and self-report measures of liking is evaluative conditioning (EC), which refers to a change in the evaluation of a stimulus due to its pairing with another stimulus. Research has documented that EC can also occur when participants are merely informed about upcoming stimulus pairings. In a recent study, participants reported a more negative evaluation of non-words that were instructed to be followed by an unpleasant sound compared to non-words that would not to be followed by this sound (De Houwer, Mattavelli, & Van Dessel, 2019). Interestingly, however, an unexpected pattern was observed on an IAT, that is, a preference for the stimulus said to be followed by the sound. We report three pre-registered experiments (N = 650) in which we manipulated different aspects of the procedure such as the stimuli, instructions, and the measure, but that still revealed the same dissociation. Based on three pilot experiments (N = 92), we then conducted a registered report study (Experiment 4) testing whether the unexpected effect depends on how the USs are labelled in the instructions. Although describing the aversive sound as negative eliminated the unexpected IAT effect, the type of instruction only had a weak impact on IAT effects. These results are in line with prior evidence showing that IAT scores are malleable.

Individual Variation in Pain Sensitivity and Implicit Negative Bias Toward Pain.

Although previous studies have shown the linkage between pain sensitivity and pain-related cognitions, this study investigated whether individual variation in pain sensitivity is related to implicit negative bias toward pain. Two groups of participants with low (LPS) or high (HPS) pain sensitivity (LPS group: n = 33; HPS group: n = 31) were recruited based on their scores on pain sensitivity questionnaires. This categorization was later confirmed via pain ratings to electrical stimulations. Implicit negative bias toward pain was assessed using the Implicit Association Test (IAT) involving target (pain and nonpain) and attribute (negative and neutral-affect) concept words. Behavioral and event-related potential responses for congruent and incongruent pairings during the IAT were compared between the LPS and HPS groups. Relative to the LPS group, participants in the HPS group exhibited greater D-score (Cohen's d = 0.364, p = .004). Event-related potential results showed that, although P3 amplitudes to congruent and incongruent pairings differed significantly for the HPS group (Cohen's d = 0.757, p < .001), this difference was not observed for the LPS group (Cohen's d = 0.089, p = .29). Mediation analysis further revealed that the IAT effect on P3 responses accounted for 17.58% of the association between pain sensitivity and D-score (confidence interval = [0.009-0.051]). Individual variation in pain sensitivity relates to implicit negative bias. This linkage is partially accounted for by the electrophysiological response that has been related to cognitive process of stimulus evaluation and categorization. Pain treatment might benefit from techniques designed to alter implicit bias.

The role of explicit categorization in the Implicit Association Test.

The present study investigated how task-irrelevant attributes of a stimulus affected responses in a multiattribute version of the Implicit Association Test (IAT). In Experiment 1, participants categorized images of Black and White male and female individuals on the basis of either race or gender. Both the race and gender of the individuals affected task performance regardless of which attribute was currently relevant to performing the task, yielding the IAT effects on both attributes. However, the influences of a task-irrelevant attribute depended on whether the task-relevant attribute was categorized compatibly or incompatibly with the underlying implicit biases. These results suggest that individuals are still categorized implicitly based on task-irrelevant social attributes and that the explicit categorization required in the standard IAT has a considerable impact on implicit social biases. Experiment 2 considered a third, nonsocial attribute (the color of the picture frame) and reproduced task-irrelevant IAT effects and their dependence on explicit categorization. However, Experiments 3 and 4 suggested that the task-irrelevant IAT effects based on social attributes are determined by whether the task-relevant attribute is a social or nonsocial attribute. The results raise fundamental questions about the basic assumptions underpinning the interpretations of the results from the IAT. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Does discrimination beat association in the IAT? The discrimination-association model reconceived.

The discrimination-association model (DAM; Stefanutti et al. 2013) disentangles two components underlying the responses to the implicit association test (IAT), which pertain to stimuli discrimination (the strength of the association of the stimuli with their own category) and automatic association (the strength of the association between targets and attributes). The assumption of the DAM that these two components sum into a single process generates critical drawbacks. The present work provides a new formulation of the model, called DAM-4C, in which stimuli discrimination and automatic association are separate, independent, and competing processes. Results of theoretical and simulation studies suggest that the DAM-4C outperforms the DAM. The IAT effect is found to vary with the association rates of the DAM-4C and not with those of the DAM. The parameters of the DAM-4C fitted on data from a Coca-Pepsi IAT are found to account for variance in brand attractiveness, taste preference, and cola choice that is not accounted for by the D score and the diffusion model. In addition, the association rates estimated on data from a Black-White IAT are in line with expectations.

Young Coloureds’ implicit attitudes towards two historically White English accents in the South African context

Abstract This study explores the implicit language attitudes of a sample of 84 young Coloured South Africans towards two historically White accents in the country: the Standard South African English accent and Afrikaans-accented English. In order to shed light on the role of language in the process of social categorization among the younger generations, I present a mixed-methodological approach that investigates the interrelation between the results of an Implicit Association Test (IAT) towards the two selected accents and the participants’ linguistic background, language exposure, and social distance levels. Within the target demographic, the data confirm the existence of an overall positive implicit attitude towards Standard South African English, although positive attitudes towards Afrikaans-accented English were not uncommon. Correlations between IAT effect and the variables “social distance levels with Whites” and “places of residence” provide potential explanations and valuable sociolinguistic information about the language dynamics in this diverse ethnic group.

Survey-software implicit association tests: A methodological and empirical analysis.

The implicit association test (IAT) is widely used in psychology. Unfortunately, the IAT cannot be run within online surveys, requiring researchers who conduct online surveys to rely on third-party tools. We introduce a novel method for constructing IATs using online survey software (Qualtrics); we then empirically assess its validity. Study 1 (student n = 239) revealed good psychometric properties, expected IAT effects, and expected correlations with explicit measures for survey-software IATs. Study 2 (MTurk n = 818) showed predicted IAT effects across four survey-software IATs (ds = 0.82 [Black-White IAT] to 2.13 [insect-flower IAT]). Study 3 (MTurk n = 270) compared survey-software IATs and IATs run via Inquisit, yielding nearly identical results and intercorrelations that would be expected for identical IATs. Survey-software IATs appear to be reliable and valid, offer numerous advantages, and make IATs accessible for researchers who use survey software to conduct online research. We present all the materials, links to tutorials, and an open-source tool that rapidly automates survey-software IAT construction and analysis.

The Automatic Evaluation of Regularity and Semantic Decodability in Wallpaper Decorative Patterns.

The perception and evaluation of decorative patterns can have a high impact in daily life but has received little empirical attention. This article attempts to offer some insight in terms of the regularity and semantic decodability. The implicit attitudes of subjects were measured by the Implicit Association Test. The results showed that regularity and semantic information can be automatically evaluated. The regular and realistic wallpaper decorative patterns are implicitly preferred to random and abstract ones. The Implicit Association Test effect of the former was greater than the latter. The increase in the number of motifs led to a decrease in the response latencies of regular and realistic patterns. The findings indicated that the processing fluency of wallpaper patterns is enhanced by a translational symmetry operation and a higher conceptual fluency of motifs. The resulting processing acceleration in high-density patterns may be due to the formation of a better Gestalt when the motifs are closer to one another.

Metabolic state as a modulator of neural event-related potentials for food stimuli in an implicit association test

The Implicit Association Test (IAT) has become a ubiquitous measure of implicit associations or preferences in several fields of research, including research related to food choices. The neural dynamics of the IAT have been explored in several contexts, but in a food-related IAT with stimuli of natural motivational value they are yet to be studied. Additionally, the effect of metabolic state on them is poorly known.The present study examined the event-related potentials (ERP) in healthy non-obese females (n = 32) while they performed a food-related IAT in two sessions, in a fasted state and after a meal.The results showed differences in the ERP components N400, P3 and LPP by congruence categories. Additionally, the individual N400 and LPP deflections correlated strongly with individual IAT effects. ERP deflections were weaker in the fasted state than after the meal despite greater implicit hedonic motivation towards food in the fasted state.In conclusion, the results suggest that ERPs reflect the IAT effect. The N400, P3 and LPP components were evoked in a food-related IAT in a similar way observed in IAT tests in other contexts, reflecting a difference in meaning and motivation between congruence categories. The strong correlations of individual IAT effect with individual N400 and LPP deflections further suggests that the food-related IAT effect strength reflects the size of implicit food bias seen in neural deflections. Moreover, fasting increased implicit hedonic motivation towards food, but likely reduced cognitive resources at the same time. This could have made it harder to determine the value of novel, task-relevant stimuli, whereas it became easier postprandially and with practice.

The Neural Correlates of Implicit Cognitive Bias Toward Internet-Related Cues in Internet Addiction: An ERP Study.

Internet addiction is a sort of non-psychoactive substance dependence. The Implicit Association Test (IAT) is used to measure implicit cognition. Event-related potential (ERP) is one of the most widely used methods in cognitive neuroscience research to investigate the physiological correlates of cognitive activity associated with processing information. Further investigating the ERP characteristics of implicit cognitive bias in Internet addiction would be helpful in understanding the nature of Internet addiction. This study investigated the ERP characteristics of implicit cognitive bias in Internet addiction. The participants included 60 Internet-addicted individuals (IAG) and 60 normal controls (NCG). All participants were measured with ERPs using the IAT. The results showed that there was a significant difference in the Internet-related IAT effect for reaction times between IAG and NCG, and there were stronger positive implicit associations toward Internet related cues in IAG than NCG. Using P1, N2, P3, and N4 as dependent variables, a mixed repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) on the mean latencies and mean amplitudes revealed a significant interaction between the groups (IAG vs. NCG) and stimulus condition (compatible trials vs. incompatible trials) for the N2 and P3 amplitudes; the simple effects analysis showed that the N2 and P3 amplitudes were larger under the IAG-compatible trial conditions than under the IAG-incompatible trial conditions. In the IAG group, the positive implicit associations with Internet-related cues elicited larger N2 and P3 amplitudes at the occipital lobe sites. These results indicated that Internet addictive individuals show stronger positive implicit associations toward Internet-related cues, and the positive implicit associations toward Internet-related cues elicited ERP changes at occipital lobe sites.

Reduction of implicit cognitive bias with cathodal tDCS to the left prefrontal cortex.

Implicit associations can interfere with cognitive operations and behavioral decisions without direct intention. Enhancement of neural activity with anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) was proposed to reduce implicit associations by means of improved cognitive control. However, a targeted reduction of distractive implicit associations by inhibitory cathodal tDCS, recently shown in spatial-numerical associations, provides an interesting alternative approach to support goal-directed behavior with transcranial brain stimulation. To test this rationale with a sham-controlled cross-over design, a standardized Implicit Association Test (IAT) was performed by 24 healthy participants parallel to 1 mA cathodal or sham tDCS to the left prefrontal cortex. In this double-classification task, insect versus flower pictures and negative versus positive words are mapped together onto two shared response keys with crossed response assignments in separate blocks. Responses were faster when insect + negative and flower + positive stimuli required the same answer (IAT effect). Most critically, the IAT effect was reduced during cathodal tDCS as compared to sham stimulation. Thus, results are consistent with the proposed stimulation rationale, with previous observations, and complementary to previous studies using different tDCS configurations.

Role of Spontaneous Brain Activity in Explicit and Implicit Aspects of Cognitive Flexibility under Socially Conflicting Situations: A Resting-state fMRI Study using Fractional Amplitude of Low-frequency Fluctuations

We are constantly exposed to socially conflicting situations in everyday life, and cognitive flexibility is essential for adaptively coping with such difficulties. Flexible goal choice and pursuit are not exclusively conscious, and therefore cognitive flexibility involves both explicit and implicit forms of processing. However, it is unclear how individual differences in explicit and implicit aspects of flexibility are associated with neural activity in a resting state. Here, we measured intrinsic fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (fALFF) by resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (RS-fMRI) as an indicator of regional brain spontaneous activity, together with explicit and implicit aspects of cognitive flexibility using the Cognitive Flexibility Scale (CFS) and Implicit Association Test (IAT). Consistent with the dual processing theory, there was a strong association between explicit aspects of flexibility (CFS score) and “rationalism” thinking style and between implicit aspects (IAT effect) and “experientialism.” The level of explicit flexibility was also correlated with fALFF values in the left lateral prefrontal cortex, whereas the level of implicit flexibility was correlated with fALFF values in the right cerebellum. Furthermore, the fALFF values in both regions predicted individual preference for flexible decision-making strategy in a vignettes simulation task. These results add to our understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying flexible decision-making for solving social conflicts. More generally, our findings highlight the utility of RS-fMRI combined with both explicit and implicit psychometric measures for better understanding individual differences in social cognition.

"Worse but Ours," or "Better but Theirs?" - The Role of Implicit Consumer Ethnocentrism (ICE) in Product Preference.

The goal of this project was to investigate whether consumer ethnocentrism is purely conscious mechanism based on ideology, as suggested by Shimp and Sharma (1987), or rather is an automatic, unconscious process. The aim of the project was an introduction of the Implicit Consumer Ethnocentrism (ICE) concept, measured by the Implicit Association Test (IAT). The goal of the four studies conducted was to investigate the following issues: (a) whether ICE – an automatic mechanism underlying the preference for local products over foreign – this could be observed next to the more ideologically based classic consumer ethnocentrism; (b) what happens when the consumer’s automatic preference for local products (ICE) is confronted by objective evidence of the superiority of foreign products or by the inferiority of local products. It was assumed that ICE could be reduced when foreign products were associated with a higher level of competence than local products, and this could explain the preference for foreign products over local often observed in less developed countries. In study 1 the ICE for different product categories of existing brands was tested, and in study 2 the ICE was measured in the context of non-existent brands. Both studies showed a strong in-group brand preference and confirmed the existence of new phenomena – ICE. The results of studies 3 and 4 again indicated a strong, automatic in-group brand favoritism effect as measured by IAT – participants preferred local brands over foreign. However, the inclusion of well-known foreign brands associated with high competence reduced the IAT effect (in-group preference).

Categorization and Prediction of Crimes of Passion Based on Attitudes Toward Violence.

The present study explored implicit and explicit attitudes toward violence in crimes of passion. Criminals ( n = 96) who had perpetrated crimes of passion and students ( n = 100) participated in this study. Explicit attitudes toward violence were evaluated using the Abnormal Personality Risk Inventory (APRI), and implicit attitude toward violence was evaluated using the Implicit Association Test (IAT). Results indicated that APRI scores of the perpetrators were significantly higher than that of the control group ( p < .05), suggesting that explicit attitudes toward violence could discriminate between the criminals and the control group. There was a significant IAT effect demonstrating a negative implicit attitude toward violence in both the control group and in the criminals ( n = 68); whereas there was a significant IAT effect manifesting a positive implicit attitude toward violence in the criminals ( n = 16) only. These results suggest that combining explicit and implicit attitudes could provide an empirical classification of crimes of passion.

Can Implicit Attitudes Toward Other Countries be Changed?

We aimed to determine whether or not implicit attitudes toward other countries can be changed by priming with friend/enemy identification manipulations. Participants comprised 60 Chinese adult men whose implicit attitudes toward India and South Korea were measured with the Implicit Association Test (IAT). They were then randomly assigned to 1 of 2 groups: pro-India, in which participants read a short article indicating that India was a friend and South Korea was an enemy, and pro-South Korea, in which the opposite primes were used. Participants then wrote a short paper to support the assigned identity, and completed the IAT a second time. Repeated measures analyses of variance of IAT effects revealed a significant interaction between test time and groups, showing that implicit attitudes had been significantly changed by the 2 identification primes.

Clocking the social mind by identifying mental processes in the IAT with electrical neuroimaging

Why do people take longer to associate the word "love" with outgroup words (incongruent condition) than with ingroup words (congruent condition)? Despite the widespread use of the implicit association test (IAT), it has remained unclear whether this IAT effect is due to additional mental processes in the incongruent condition, or due to longer duration of the same processes. Here, we addressed this previously insoluble issue by assessing the spatiotemporal evolution of brain electrical activity in 83 participants. From stimulus presentation until response production, we identified seven processes. Crucially, all seven processes occurred in the same temporal sequence in both conditions, but participants needed more time to perform one early occurring process (perceptual processing) and one late occurring process (implementing cognitive control to select the motor response) in the incongruent compared with the congruent condition. We also found that the latter process contributed to individual differences in implicit bias. These results advance understanding of the neural mechanics of response time differences in the IAT: They speak against theories that explain the IAT effect as due to additional processes in the incongruent condition and speak in favor of theories that assume a longer duration of specific processes in the incongruent condition. More broadly, our data analysis approach illustrates the potential of electrical neuroimaging to illuminate the temporal organization of mental processes involved in social cognition.

Neural Patterns of the Implicit Association Test.

The Implicit Association Test (IAT) is a reaction time based categorization task that measures the differential associative strength between bipolar targets and evaluative attribute concepts as an approach to indexing implicit beliefs or biases. An open question exists as to what exactly the IAT measures, and here EEG (Electroencephalography) has been used to investigate the time course of ERPs (Event-related Potential) indices and implicated brain regions in the IAT. IAT-EEG research identifies a number of early (250–450 ms) negative ERPs indexing early-(pre-response) processing stages of the IAT. ERP activity in this time range is known to index processes related to cognitive control and semantic processing. A central focus of these efforts has been to use IAT-ERPs to delineate the implicit and explicit factors contributing to measured IAT effects. Increasing evidence indicates that cognitive control (and related top-down modulation of attention/perceptual processing) may be components in the effective measurement of IAT effects, as factors such as physical setting or task instruction can change an IAT measurement. In this study we further implicate the role of proactive cognitive control and top-down modulation of attention/perceptual processing in the IAT-EEG. We find statistically significant relationships between D-score (a reaction-time based measure of the IAT-effect) and early ERP-time windows, indicating where more rapid word categorizations driving the IAT effect are present, they are at least partly explainable by neural activity not significantly correlated with the IAT measurement itself. Using LORETA, we identify a number of brain regions driving these ERP-IAT relationships notably involving left-temporal, insular, cingulate, medial frontal and parietal cortex in time regions corresponding to the N2- and P3-related activity. The identified brain regions involved with reduced reaction times on congruent blocks coincide with those of previous studies.

Dynamic competition and binding of concepts through time and space.

Models of implicit stereotypes (e.g., association of male with math or female with language) usually explain the faster responses observed for stereotype-congruent trials in the Implicit Association Test (IAT) by requiring a fundamental opposition between the male and female concepts (or math-language), limiting the decision-making dynamics to abstract dimensions. This paper introduces alternate models exploiting the sensorimotor dimensions of the IAT, which naturally account for the opposition between concepts, because typically mapped on opposite corners of the screen space and on different response actions. In addition to the emergence of the IAT effect, dynamic characteristics of the decision-making process within these models are tested against human data, obtained with a mouse-tracking adapted IAT procedure.