Implicit Cues Research Articles

Vocabulary-learning cues used on children’s bilingual programming

ABSTRACT This study is a content analysis of bilingual children’s television through the lens of bilingual language learning. In this study, we examined the content of five popular children’s television shows (Dora the Explorer, Go, Diego, Go!, Maya & Miguel, Handy Manny, and Nina’s World), and their use of languages (noun tokens, phrases, translations), and vocabulary-learning cues to support vocabulary in preschoolers. Our findings indicate that there are a variety of instructional strategies used by the programs. However, some TV programs (Dora the Explorer and Go, Diego, Go!) tend to use both explicit and implicit learning cues more than other programs. Although research is needed to determine whether certain shows lead to more learning than others, our results suggest the aforementioned programs provide more vocabulary-learning cues than others.

Can you voluntarily forget what you are planning to forget? Behavioral evidence for the underlying truth of the cost-benefit principle.

Directed forgetting (DF) or intentional forgetting can impair the recall of items cued to be forgotten (so-called cost) but can also improve the recall of items cued to be remembered (so-called benefit), following the cost-benefit principle. However, whether the forget cue is the cause of intentional forgetting is doubtful. Several studies suggest that intentional forgetting is extremely hard by introducing a noncue condition, but it is not enough to explain how the cost-benefit principle works without forgetting. Here, two series of experiments are designed to test the voluntary control ability of attentional resource allocation from memory benefits to costs. In the Experiment 1 series, we changed the position and content of cues, replicating the DF effect and the analogous effect without a forget cue. The results showed that precueing can mildly upregulate memory attentional resources to improve performance while incurring memory costs for other items. Since forced remembering can also induce memory costs and benefits, the cost-benefit principle may not be attributed to DF. In the Experiment 2 series, we further demonstrated that memory costs and benefits exist when implicit cues are employed. Overall, when the results of all memory costs in the above experiments are compared with a noncue condition as the baseline in Experiment 2c, there exist no significant differences. The current results indicate that we can voluntarily upregulate our memory performance for certain items but cannot voluntarily downregulate memory encoding, generalizing the selective attentional resource control account to the cost-benefit principle beyond the directed-forgetting effect.

Combining verbal and visual cueing: Fostering learning pictorial content by coordinating verbal explanations with different types of visual cueing

Multimedia learning scenarios in which a picture is the main focus often use combinations of verbal and visual cueing. Based on models of picture processing and multimedia learning, the present study examined the effect of verbal and visual cueing on two basic aspects of pictorial learning: retention and localization of pictorial elements. Videos of three paintings were presented with verbal cueing (naming of pictorial elements), either alone or in combination with visual frames (explicit cues) or zoom-ins (implicit cues), in a 2 × 3 × 3 mixed design (n = 86) with the factors verbal cueing (uncued vs. cued elements, within-subjects) × visual cueing (no vs. explicit vs. implicit, between-subjects) × film (Mantegna vs. Rubens vs. Marsh, within-subjects). The three films were used to check whether our results are generalizable across different pictorial contents. The retention of pictorial elements was measured by open questions, and the localization of the pictorial elements was measured by asking the participants to place picture snippets at the correct location on an area representing the dimensions of the respective painting. The combination of verbal and visual cueing increased the difference between the cued and the less well retained uncued elements and compensated a disadvantage of verbal cueing for localization performance. This was compensated by both types of visual cueing. Regarding retention and localization, explicit and implicit cueing were equally effective. The study provides a differentiated insight into the interplay of verbal and visual cueing regarding cognitive processing in multimedia learning scenarios in which pictures are the main learning focus.

Superstitious beliefs and the associative mind.

Persistence of superstitions in the modern era could be justified by considering them as a by-product of the brain's capacity to detect associations and make assumptions about cause-effect relationships. This ability, which supports predictive behaviour, directly relates to associative learning. We tested whether variability in superstitious behaviour reflects individual variability in the efficiency of mechanisms akin to habit learning. Forty-eight individuals performed a Serial Reaction Time Task (SRTT) or an Implicit Cuing Task (ICT). In the SRTT, participants were exposed to a hidden sequence and progressively learnt to optimize responses, a process akin to skill learning. In the ICT participants met with a hidden association, which (if detected) provided a benefit (cf. habit learning). An index of superstitious beliefs was also collected. A correlation emerged between susceptibility to personal superstitions and performance at the ICT only. This novel finding is discussed in view of current ideas on how superstitions are instated.

Age differences in the use of implicit visual cues in a response time task

Background: Many activities require a complex interrelationship between a performer and stimuli available in the environment without explicit perception, but many aspects regarding developmental changes in the use of implicit cues remain unknown. Aim: To investigate the use of implicit visual precueing presented at different time intervals in children, adolescents, and adults. Method: Seventy-two people, male and female, constituted four age groups: 8-, 10- and 12-year-olds and adults. Participants performed 32 trials, four-choice-time task across four conditions: no precue and a 43 ms centralized dot appearing in the stimulus circle at 43, 86 or 129 ms prior the stimulus. Response times were obtained for each trial and pooled into each condition. Results: Response times for 8-year-olds were longer than for 12-year-olds and adults and for 10-year-olds were longer than for adults. Response times were longer in the no precue condition compared to when precues were presented at 86 and 129 ms before the stimulus. Response times were longer when precue was presented at 43 ms compared presented at 129 ms before the stimulus. Interpretation: Implicit precues reduce response time in children, adolescents and adults, but young children benefit less from implicit precues than adolescents and adults.

Assessing How Gender, Relationship Status, and Item Wording Influence Cues Used by College Students to Decline Different Sexual Behaviors

Researchers rarely examine college students’ event-level refusals and how refusals may change based on sexual behavior, gender, or relationship status. As such, we assessed how sexual behavior and demographic characteristics influence cues students use to decline sexual activity. As an exploratory aim, we examined the influence of item wording (such as reading the words, not willing/non-consent vs. refusal) on how students reported declining sexual activity. A sample of 615 college students from Canada and the U.S. completed a survey; students were randomly assigned to one of two conditions that manipulated item wording (not willing/non-consent vs. refusal). Students were then prompted with four open-ended questions that asked how they refused/communicated non-consent for four sexual behaviors. An inductive coding procedure was used and five overarching themes emerged. Three themes included explicit and implicit verbal cues and two themes included explicit and implicit non-verbal cues. Wording condition (i.e., not willing/non-consent v. refusal) did not influence the types of cues reported by students. Refusal communication varied by sexual behavior and relationship status but not gender. Sexual assault prevention initiatives should include more information about the variety of refusal cues used by college students in their programming, as many of these cues are currently absent.

Variation is the Spice of Spelling: The Effect of Implicit Cues on Dutch Past Tense Spelling is Dependent on Age, Literacy, and Task Format

ABSTRACT Spelling is influenced by implicit cues, but less is known about variability in this reliance. We assessed whether the influence of three implicit cues on Dutch past tense spelling was moderated by grade, literacy, and format. An Auditory infinitive, Written infinitive, and Picture+cloze format was completed by 68 third-graders and 47 sixth-graders. The implicit cues voicing probability and token frequency affected accuracy, especially in Grade 6 and in children with higher literacy skills, and in the picture+cloze task format. This shows that there is a variety of implicit cues that contribute to children’s spelling. This variability in reliance on implicit cues is shaped both by child ability as well as by task format.

The Effects of Mating Cues and Intrasexual Competition on Humor Production

The roles of mating cues and of intrasexual competition in humor production have not yet been assessed. Therefore, the present study explored the influence of implicit mating cues on humor enhancement. In two experiments involving 306 participants, using a priming methodology to examine sex differences and enhancement in humor production ability, participants were exposed to unattractive and attractive opposite-sex photographs, after which their humor production ability was rated. Studies differed in presentation durations of primes, and manipulation of intrasexual competition. The findings of Study 2 showed that, under conditions of intrasexual competition, men were superior to women in humor production ability and exhibited enhancement in humor ability following exposure to attractive women primes. The findings broaden the evolutionary cognitive framework in relation to sexual selection, differential parental investment, and social cognition.

Mental imagery and colour cues can prevent interference between motor tasks

Motor interference can be observed when two motor tasks are learnt in subsequent order. The aim of the current study was to test two approaches potentially mitigating interference effects. The first approach used contextual colour cues requiring only little cognitive attention thus being assumed to be primarily implicit while the second, mental practice/rehearsal that demands much more active cognitive processing being considered explicit.Six groups performed a ballistic strength training immediately followed by the practice of an interfering visuomotor tracking task. Two groups received a contextual colour cue when presenting feedback about ballistic performance. During the practice of the interfering motor task, one of the two groups received the same colour cue during random trials while the other group received a different colour cue and a third control group no colour cue at all. The forth group mentally rehearsed the ballistic task during the practice of the interference task, while the respective control groups either mentally rehearsed a ramp and hold contraction instead of the ballistic task or didn’t rehearse any task. The ballistic performance was tested before and after the ballistic training and in an immediate retention test after the learning of the interfering motor task.All groups significantly increased their ballistic performance after training. After practicing the interfering motor tracking, subjects receiving the same colour cue and subjects that mentally rehearsed the ballistic task did not show significant interference effect while all other groups did. These results indicate that implicit cuing with the same cue as well as explicit mental rehearsal of the initially learnt task can help to prevent motor interference without affecting performance improvements of the second motor task.

Implicit visual cues tune oscillatory motor activity during decision-making

Motor decisions entails a buildup of choice-selective activity in the motor cortex. The rate of this buildup crucially depends on the amount of evidence favoring the selection of each action choice in the visual environment. Though numerous studies have characterized how sensory evidence drives motor activity when processed consciously, very little is known about the neural mechanisms that underlie the integration of implicit sources of information.Here, we used electroencephalography to investigate the impact of implicit visual cues on response-locked potentials and oscillatory activity in the motor cortex during decision-making. Subjects were required to select between left and right index finger responses according to the motion direction of a cloud of dots presented in one of three possible colors. Unbeknown to the participants, the color cue could bring evidence either in favor of or against the selection of the correct response.Implicit color cues tuned choice-selective oscillatory activity in the low beta range (16–25 Hz), boosting the buildup of contralateral activity when evidence favored the selection of the correct action, while weakening it when evidence biased against the correct response. This modulation of oscillatory activity influenced the speed at which the correct action was eventually chosen. Implicit cues also altered oscillatory activity in a non-selective way in the low frequency oscillation (1–7 Hz) and high beta ranges (25–35 Hz), impacting both contralateral and ipsilateral activity. The current findings yield a critical extension of prior observations by indicating that the integration of both explicit and implicit sources of evidence tunes oscillatory motor activity during decision-making.

Detecting implicit cues of aggressiveness in male faces in revictimized female PTSD patients and healthy controls

Victimized women are thought to have impairments in identifying risk and to have dysfunctional reactions to threatening situations, which increase the risk for revictimization. To investigate possible deficits in revictimized women, we used a method examining women's perceptions of an implicit facial cue of aggressiveness – the facial Width-to-Height Ratio (fWHR). We tested whether revictimized women show impairments in detecting aggressiveness in male faces by neglecting cues of fWHR and choosing a smaller preferred distance to men. Fifty-two revictimized PTSD patients and 52 healthy controls provided ratings of aggressiveness and attractiveness for 65 photographed men and chose their preferred distance towards 11 pictured men. Multiple regression analyses indicated that revictimized women do not show impairments in perceiving and reacting to cues of aggression accurately. Hierarchical linear models, however, indicated that revictimized women rated all men as less aggressive. Revictimized women with histories of intimate partner violence (IPV) rated men with larger fWHRs and higher values of actual aggression to be more attractive than did revictimized women without IPV histories. A reduced appraisal of threat signals as threatening and an attraction to wider-faced and more aggressive men might increase the risk for revictimization.

The Need for Combining Implicit and Explicit Communication in Cooperative Robotic Systems.

As the number of robots used in warehouses and manufacturing increases, so too does the need for robots to be able to manipulate objects, not only independently, but also in collaboration with humans and other robots. Our ability to effectively coordinate our actions with fellow humans encompasses several behaviours that are collectively referred to as joint action, and has inspired advances in human-robot interaction by leveraging our natural ability to interpret implicit cues. However, our capacity to efficiently coordinate on object manipulation tasks remains an advantageous process that is yet to be fully exploited in robotic applications. Humans achieve this form of coordination by combining implicit communication (where information is inferred) and explicit communication (direct communication through an established channel) in varying degrees according to the task at hand. Although these two forms of communication have previously been implemented in robotic systems, no system exists that integrates the two in a task-dependent adaptive manner. In this paper, we review existing work on joint action in human-robot interaction, and analyse the state-of-the-art in robot-robot interaction that could act as a foundation for future cooperative object manipulation approaches. We identify key mechanisms that must be developed in order for robots to collaborate more effectively, with other robots and humans, on object manipulation tasks in shared autonomy spaces.

High voice pitch mitigates the aversiveness of antisocial cues in men's speech.

Speech contains both explicit social information in semantic content and implicit cues to social behaviour and mate quality in voice pitch. Voice pitch has been demonstrated to have pervasive effects on social perceptions, but few studies have examined these perceptions in the context of meaningful speech. Here, we examined whether male voice pitch interacted with socially relevant cues in speech to influence listeners' perceptions of trustworthiness and attractiveness. We artificially manipulated men's voices to be higher and lower in pitch when speaking words that were either prosocial or antisocial in nature. In Study 1, we found that listeners perceived lower-pitched voices as more trustworthy and attractive in the context of prosocial words than in the context of antisocial words. In Study 2, we found evidence that suggests this effect was driven by stronger preferences for higher-pitched voices in the context of antisocial cues, as voice pitch preferences were not significantly different in the context of prosocial cues. These findings suggest that higher male voice pitch may ameliorate the negative effects of antisocial speech content and that listeners may be particularly avoidant of those who express multiple cues to antisociality across modalities.

Overruled!: Implicit cues rather than an orthographic rule determine Dutch children's vowel spelling

This study addressed the question why vowel spelling acquisition is relatively difficult for young Dutch spellers. A spelling rule guides vowel spelling, but implicit cues could also play a role. We evaluated the role of phonology, morphology, and orthography. Grade 1 (N = 113) and 2 (N = 59) children were presented with dictations of real and pseudowords differing in the degree of consistency and familiarity. Correct scores of consistent vowel spelling in Grade 1 and 2 students were near ceiling, whereas those for inconsistent vowels were low, even in Grade 2 children, who have had explicit instruction of the spelling rule. Correct scores were affected by phonological and morphological consistency, and orthographic familiarity. Effects of these implicit cues were even more pronounced in Grade 2. Findings indicate that vowel length spelling is difficult to acquire because the explicit spelling rule is overruled by various sources of implicit information.

Explicit Versus Implicit "Halal" Information: Influence of the Halal Label and the Country-of-Origin Information on Product Perceptions in Indonesia.

Halal refers to what is permissible in traditional Islamic law. Food that meets halal requirements is marked by a halal label on the packaging and should be especially attractive to those Muslims who follow the set of dietary laws outlined in the Quran. This research examines the role of the halal label (explicit cue) and the country-of-origin (COO) (implicit cue) in predicting positive product perceptions among Muslim consumers. We hypothesized that when an explicit sign of “halalness” (i.e., halal label) relating to a particular product is accompanied by an implicit sign of anti-“halalness” (i.e., non-Islamic COO information), Muslim consumers who pay attention to the dietary laws of Islam would have negative perceptions of such a product. We tested our assumptions in an experiment conducted among Indonesian participants who declared themselves as Muslims (n = 444). We manipulated: (a) exposure to the halal label, and (b) the COO information. Religion-based purchase behavior was measured as a moderator variable. Positive product perceptions were measured as a dependent variable. The results showed that the halal label itself had limited influence on product perceptions. However, we found that positive product perceptions significantly decreased among people who were high in religion-based purchase behavior in response to exposure to non-Islamic COO information accompanied by a halal label. In conclusion, people who are high (vs. low) in religion-based purchase behavior do not seem to trust halal-labeled food produced in a country with other than an Islamic tradition.

Assessing the climate of public opinion in the user comments era: A new epistemology

This article examines the role of user comments in evaluating the climate of public opinion. It aims to evaluate the relevance of quasi-statistical assessment of public opinion – which was tailored to traditional media – to the digital era. The article, based on 21 interviews with Israeli users of news websites, argues that comments-browsing on the Internet gives a new meaning to the notion of a quasi-statistical assessment of public opinion. The aggregation of different comments, each of which contains an implicit cue for the climate of public opinion, transforms them together into a direct cue. The effect of the merging of journalistic contents with user-generated contents side-by-side on the same website is also evaluated through the perspectives of persuasive press inference and exemplification theories.

RESOLV: Readers' Representation of Reading Contexts and Tasks

We introduce RESOLV, a theoretical model to account for readers' construction and management of goals during text comprehension and use. RESOLV focuses on readers' experience of their physical, social, and communicative context prior to actually engaging with texts. RESOLV assumes that readers construct two types of mental models prior to reading: The context model is a representation of the physical and social reading context, whereas the task model is a set of goals and plans that drives readers' decisions and actions in reading. We first present the RESOLV model, and we articulate two core hypotheses. We then present and discuss evidence supporting these hypotheses, from past and more recent research conducted in our labs, as well as in others'. The data support the view that reading decisions and processes are guided by readers' perceptions and attributions regarding the task statement but also more implicit cues from the reading context.

Biasing spatial attention with semantic information: an event coding approach

We investigated the influence of conceptual processing on visual attention from the standpoint of Theory of Event Coding (TEC). The theory makes two predictions: first, an important factor in determining the influence of event 1 on processing event 2 is whether features of event 1 are bound into a unified representation (i.e., selection or retrieval of event 1). Second, whether processing the two events facilitates or interferes with each other should depend on the extent to which their constituent features overlap. In two experiments, participants performed a visual-attention cueing task, in which the visual target (event 2) was preceded by a relevant or irrelevant explicit (e.g., "UP") or implicit (e.g., "HAPPY") spatial-conceptual cue (event 1). Consistent with TEC, we found relevant explicit cues (which featurally overlap to a greater extent with the target) and implicit cues (which featurally overlap to a lesser extent), respectively, facilitated and interfered with target processing at compatible locations. Irrelevant explicit and implicit cues, on the other hand, both facilitated target processing, presumably because they were less likely selected or retrieved as an integrated and unified event file. We argue that such effects, often described as "attentional cueing", are better accounted for within the event coding framework.

Should I Share That? Prompting Social Norms That Influence Privacy Behaviors on a Social Networking Site

This study examines how explicit and implicit cues to social norms affect disclosure and privacy decisions in a Social Network Site SNS context. Study 1 revealed that participants' disclosure behavior adhered to explicit cues indicating disclosure frequency norms, while implicit social norm cues i.e., surveillance primes acted to increase overall disclosure frequency and affect disclosure accuracy when explicit cues discourage disclosure. Study 2 explored how these cues affected privacy-setting decisions and found that explicit cues indicating others' privacy settings could increase how strictly participants set their privacy settings, but the implicit cues had no effect. These results suggest that explicit cues about SNS norms can trigger bandwagon heuristic processing, and that, under limited circumstances, surveillance primes can affect self-disclosure.

Влияние имплицитной подсказки на автоматические процессы обработки информации в задаче на решение анаграмм

This article presents the results of a study, aimed at exploring the influence of implicit cues on early “automatic” processes (first 400 ms) in anagram solving task. During six experimental series participants were shown two type of stimuli: anagrams and pseudowords in random order. Participants had to discriminate the type of stimuli, solve the anagrams and response (by key pressing), whether it was insight solution or not. In the first five series pseudowords had a special cue (letters “A” and “O”). There were no such cues in anagrams. In the last experimental series there were no cues on both pseudowords and anagrams. The participants did not know about such differences. The electroencephalography (EEG) was recorded during this study. It was shown that discrimination time decreased from the first to the fifth series, but increase in the last series. The number of correct discriminations increased from the first to the fifth series, and decreased in the last one. EEG analysis showed significant difference in amplitude of late positive component on interval 200 to 300 ms after stimuli between anagrams and pseudowords. This findings may be explained by activation of semantic network, which is involved in anagram solution processing. This work was supported by grant RSCF № 14-18-03773.