Brocher Andreas, Koenig Jean-Pierre
Department of Linguistics, University at Buffalo, The State University of New York, USA.
Adv Cogn Psychol. 2016 Mar 31;12(1):50-66. doi: 10.5709/acp-0186-x. eCollection 2016.
Negative compatibility effects (NCEs)-that is, slower responses to targets in related than unrelated prime-target pairs, have been observed in studies using stimulus-response (S-R) priming with stimuli like arrows and plus signs. Although there is no consensus on the underlying mechanism, explanations tend to locate NCEs within the motor-response system. A characteristic property of perceptuo-motor NCEs is a biphasic pattern of activation: A brief period in which very briefly presented (typically) masked primes facilitate processing of related targets is followed by a phase of target processing impairment. In this paper, we present data that suggest that NCEs are not restricted to S-R priming with low-level visual stimuli: The brief (50 ms), backward masked (250 ms) presentation of ambiguous words (bank) leads to slower responses than baseline to words related to the more frequent (rob) but not less frequent meaning (swim). Importantly, we found that slowed responses are preceded by a short phase of response facilitation, replicating the biphasic pattern reported for arrows and plus signs. The biphasic pattern of priming and the fact that the NCEs were found only for target words that are related to their prime word's more frequent meaning has strong implications for any theory of NCEs that locate these effects exclusively within the motor-response system.
负兼容性效应（NCEs）——也就是说，在使用箭头和加号等刺激进行刺激-反应（S-R）启动的研究中，与不相关的启动-目标对相比，对相关目标的反应更慢——已经被观察到。尽管对于潜在机制尚无共识，但解释往往将负兼容性效应定位在运动反应系统内。感知-运动负兼容性效应的一个特征是双相激活模式：在一段短暂的时间内，非常短暂呈现（通常是）掩蔽启动刺激促进相关目标的加工，随后是目标加工受损阶段。在本文中，我们提供的数据表明，负兼容性效应并不局限于使用低水平视觉刺激的S-R启动：对模棱两可的单词（bank）进行短暂（50毫秒）、向后掩蔽（250毫秒）的呈现，与基线相比，对与更常见意义（rob）相关但与不太常见意义（swim）无关的单词的反应更慢。重要的是，我们发现反应变慢之前有一个短暂的反应促进阶段，这重复了针对箭头和加号所报道的双相模式。启动的双相模式以及仅在与启动词更常见意义相关的目标词中发现负兼容性效应这一事实，对于任何将这些效应完全定位在运动反应系统内的负兼容性效应理论都具有重要意义。
