Jonas Clare N, Spiller Mary Jane, Jansari Ashok, Ward Jamie
a School of Psychology , University of East London , London , UK.
Q J Exp Psychol (Hove). 2014;67(7):1262-73. doi: 10.1080/17470218.2013.856928. Epub 2013 Dec 9.
In the theory of the mental number line, number, and space are implicitly associated, giving rise to the spatial-numerical association of response codes (SNARC) effect, in which smaller numbers are more readily associated with the left side of space and larger numbers with the right, during a parity judgement task. Others, however, have argued that the SNARC effect is flexible and better explained by verbal rather than spatial associations. A few single-case studies on the SNARC effect have tested number-space synaesthetes, who make explicit associations between number and space. Here, we present data from experiments conducted on groups of synaesthetes and nonsynaesthetes on the classic SNARC parity judgement task with lateralized response keys and a modified version in which they responded to labels appearing on screen. Synaesthetes' behaviour was expected to differ from nonsynaesthetes' behaviour due to the explicit, fixed nature of their number-space associations, but both experiments show the two groups behaving in the same way, indicating that parity judgement tasks may not be tapping the same representation of number that gives rise to synaesthetic number-space experiences.
在心理数字线理论中，数字和空间存在隐性关联，从而产生了反应编码的空间数字关联（SNARC）效应。即在奇偶判断任务中，较小数字更容易与空间左侧相关联，而较大数字则与右侧相关联。然而，其他人认为SNARC效应是灵活的，用语言关联而非空间关联来解释会更好。一些关于SNARC效应的单病例研究测试了数字-空间联觉者，他们在数字和空间之间建立了明确的关联。在此，我们展示了对联觉者和非联觉者群体进行实验的数据，实验采用了带有侧向反应键的经典SNARC奇偶判断任务，以及一个修改版本，即让他们对屏幕上出现的标签做出反应。由于联觉者数字-空间关联的明确性和固定性，预计他们的行为会与非联觉者不同，但两个实验都表明两组的行为方式相同，这表明奇偶判断任务可能没有触及产生联觉数字-空间体验的相同数字表征。
