Atas Anne, San Anton Estibaliz, Cleeremans Axel
Center for Research in Cognition and Neurosciences (CRCN), Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium,
Psychol Res. 2015 Sep;79(5):813-28. doi: 10.1007/s00426-014-0611-3. Epub 2014 Sep 26.
In masked priming tasks, participants typically respond faster to compatible than to incompatible primes, an effect that has been dubbed as the positive compatibility effect (PCE). However, when the interval between the prime and the mask is relatively long, responses are faster to incompatible than to compatible primes. This inversion is called the negative compatibility effect (NCE). Two main origins of the NCE have been proposed. The object-updating theory holds that when the masks share stimulus features with the primes, both perceptual and motor processes generate an NCE. As an example, for masks composed of overlaid left and right prime arrows, the NCE is thought to be positive priming induced by the arrow of the mask pointing in the opposite direction of the prime. In contrast, the motor inhibition theories hold that the origin of the NCE is purely motor and can be demonstrated when masks do not share features with primes. To test both hypotheses, the present study aims at delineating the respective contributions of perceptual and motor components of the NCE in the context of different types of masks. Consistent with the object-updating hypothesis, we found both perceptual and motor NCEs at the long SOA with metacontrast masks (with internal contours corresponding to left and right overlaid arrows). Consistent with the motor inhibition hypothesis, we found motor NCE but no perceptual NCE at the long SOA with random-line masks (containing no prime features). The study thus suggests that the origin of the NCE depends on the type of mask.
在掩蔽启动任务中，与不相容启动刺激相比，参与者对相容启动刺激的反应通常更快，这一效应被称为正相容效应（PCE）。然而，当启动刺激与掩蔽刺激之间的间隔相对较长时，对不相容启动刺激的反应比对相容启动刺激的反应更快。这种反转被称为负相容效应（NCE）。关于NCE的起源主要有两种观点。客体更新理论认为，当掩蔽刺激与启动刺激具有相同的刺激特征时，知觉和运动过程都会产生NCE。例如，对于由左右叠加的启动箭头组成的掩蔽刺激，NCE被认为是由掩蔽刺激中箭头指向与启动刺激相反方向所引发的正启动效应。相比之下，运动抑制理论认为，NCE的起源纯粹是运动性的，当掩蔽刺激与启动刺激不具有相同特征时也能表现出来。为了验证这两种假设，本研究旨在明确在不同类型掩蔽刺激情况下NCE中知觉和运动成分各自的作用。与客体更新假设一致，我们发现，在长刺激呈现间隔（SOA）条件下，使用元对比掩蔽刺激（内部轮廓为左右叠加箭头）时，知觉和运动NCE均存在。与运动抑制假设一致，我们发现，在长SOA条件下，使用随机线条掩蔽刺激（不包含启动刺激特征）时，存在运动NCE，但不存在知觉NCE。因此，该研究表明，NCE的起源取决于掩蔽刺激的类型。
