Department of Experimental Psychology, Ghent University, Belgium.
Conscious Cogn. 2011 Dec;20(4):1860-4. doi: 10.1016/j.concog.2011.09.004. Epub 2011 Oct 1.
An important approach to understand how the brain gives rise to consciousness is to probe the depth of unconscious processing, thus to define the key features that cause conscious awareness. Here, we investigate the possibility for subliminal stimuli to shape the context for unconscious processing. Context effects have generally been assumed to require consciousness. In the present experiment, unconscious context processing was investigated by looking at the impact of the context on the response activation elicited by a subliminal prime. We compared the effects of the same subliminal prime on target processing when the prime was embedded in different unconscious contexts. Results showed that the same prime can evoke opposite responses depending on the unconscious context in which it is presented. Taken together, the results of this study show that context effects can be unconscious.
理解大脑如何产生意识的一个重要方法是探究无意识加工的深度，从而定义导致意识的关键特征。在这里，我们研究了潜意识刺激塑造无意识加工背景的可能性。背景效应通常被认为需要意识。在本实验中，我们通过观察上下文对潜意识启动引发的反应激活的影响来研究无意识上下文处理。我们比较了在不同的无意识背景下呈现相同的潜意识启动对目标处理的影响。结果表明，相同的启动可以根据呈现的无意识背景引发相反的反应。总之，这项研究的结果表明，背景效应可以是无意识的。
