The production effect is the finding that words read aloud are usually remembered better than words read silently, a benefit commonly attributed to the encoding of additional distinctive features. Recent work extended this phenomenon to visuospatial memory but found that clicking on dots impaired order reconstruction unless rehearsal was also reduced in the control condition, suggesting a trade-off between distinctiveness and rehearsal disruption. The present study asked whether more natural, body-anchored actions would shift this balance. Participants encoded sequences of eight spatial locations on a touchscreen and later reconstructed their order. In Experiment 1A, touching each dot impaired memory relative to remaining still. In Experiment 1B, however, touching the dots improved performance relative to a control condition in which participants touched irrelevant corner locations during encoding, thereby reducing rehearsal. In Experiment 2, a stronger embodied response, touching each dot and tracing the path between successive locations, again impaired memory. Thus, increasing bodily engagement did not restore the verbal production effect pattern. The findings are interpreted within the Revised Feature Model: spatial production can add distinctive features, but its benefits are outweighed when the required action disrupts serial spatial rehearsal.
We can regulate our own and other people's emotions, but it is not clear whether we use the same strategies to regulate others' emotions as we do to regulate our own. In three preregistered studies, we compared participants' preferences for eight different emotion regulation strategies as a function of target identity. Study 1 (N = 119) compared regulating oneself versus a friend and found that direct action, distraction, suppression, and downward comparison were all used significantly more on oneself compared to a friend, while humor, valuing, and receptive listening were all used more on a friend compared to oneself. Study 2 (N = 120) then examined the role of closeness in emotion regulation strategy choice by comparing strategy preference for regulating oneself versus a close friend versus an acquaintance. Humor, valuing, receptive listening, and direct action were used significantly more on friends compared to acquaintances, while there was no significant difference for reappraisal, downward comparison, distraction, or supression. These results suggest that people show a consistent difference in preference for emotion regulation strategies as a function of who the target of the regulation is and that extrinsic and intrinsic emotion regulation may differ markedly in the strategies people choose to use. A third preregistered study (N = 120) reframed the same comparison in terms of perceived feasibility and found that the strategies participants rated as more feasible to use on themselves, a close friend, or an acquaintance closely mirrored those they reported using, suggesting that perceived feasibility may help explain target-related differences in emotion regulation choice.
Observing others' demonstrations is an important route through which children acquire causal knowledge and develop scientific thinking. Using the trap-tube paradigm, the present study investigated the effects of correct and incorrect demonstrations and their order on causal learning in 2-4-year-olds. Experiment 1 (N = 352) showed that 2-year-olds showed no evidence of causal learning across all demonstration types, and their performance did not differ significantly between conditions. Among 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds, performance was better overall in the mixed-demonstration conditions than in the single-demonstration conditions. Within mixed demonstrations, order affected only 3-year-olds, with better performance in the correct-then-incorrect condition than in the incorrect-then-correct condition. Experiment 2 (N = 365) showed that 2-year-olds did not differ significantly across demonstration types, and their performance was largely near chance, whereas 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds performed better in the mixed-demonstration conditions than in the consistent-demonstration conditions. All children were more likely to change the side of insertion in the mixed-demonstration conditions than in the consistent-demonstration conditions. Overall, the findings suggest that mixed demonstrations support causal learning from age 3 onward, whereas evidence in 2-year-olds was weak and inconsistent.
In many experimental-psychological studies, either the speed or the accuracy of responses could be the primary dependent variable of interest. Often, there is no straightforward choice and this decision is particularly difficult if there are signs of variation in speed-accuracy tradeoff across conditions and/or participants. An apparently well-validated solution to this conundrum is the inverse efficiency score (IES). The general application of IES has never actually been endorsed in the cited sources and recent validation studies show that it does not serve well any of the major purposes to which it has been applied. Its popularity may even have hampered progress on the important methodological issue of how to best combine speed and accuracy measures. The present article traces the history of IES via a literature review and with the aid of contemporary witnesses. This exercise reveals a flaw in the academic culture that could be improved by increasing the value of either checking the original sources or instead being honest about the reliance on second-hand information. The story of IES also exemplifies how ignoring fundamental methodological problems makes practitioners resort to the most accessible solutions, often relying on a simplified appeal to authority and little else.
: We investigated how cognitive control is modulated by the affective-motivational properties of food stimuli and their visual size. Prior research showed reduced switch costs - i.e., smaller costs in switch than in repetition trials - for food-related tasks compared to food-unrelated tasks. This raises the question of whether such effects are driven by the affective-motivational salience of food stimuli, by their visual salience due to larger size, or by an interaction of both factors. We addressed this using a task-switching paradigm in which participants alternated between a food categorization task (sweet/savory) and a digit categorization task (odd/even). The food stimulus was superimposed on the digit stimulus, and visual size was inverted compared to earlier studies, making the digit visually salient. Despite its smaller size, the food task still yielded reduced switch costs, suggesting that this effect cannot be attributed to visual salience. However, a direct comparison with prior findings revealed that visual size modulates the magnitude of the switch-cost asymmetry. This suggests that food stimuli improve task-set reconfiguration, but that visual salience likely plays a modulatory role. These findings indicate the need to consider motivational and perceptual factors in cognitive control research.
The forward testing effect refers to the benefit of prior testing relative to a control task on memory for subsequently learned material. The current experiment examined the effects of test format similarity and expectations on the forward testing effect. Participants studied two lists of unrelated word pairs. Following the first list, participants were either tested on it or asked to restudy it. The format of testing the first list was either cued recall or free recall. Before the presentation of the second list, participants were or were not told whether it would be tested with cued or free recall. Both types of initial test yielded a forward testing effect. The magnitude of the forward testing effect was larger when the test formats for the lists matched. Instructions improved recall independently of the similarity of the test formats across the lists. Intrusions of words from List 1 on List 2 recall were reduced by testing the first list, but that effect did not depend on the matching of test formats. The correct recall results support the metacognitive theory explanation of the forward testing effect.
: Response inhibition may be a flexible resource that is usually in a dormant state but can be awakened in particular contexts, such as angry expressions. Few existing studies have explored the influence of violent video games on players' response inhibition to angry expressions from the perspective of virtual avatars. The aim of this study was to explore the effect of violent virtual avatar experience on players' response inhibition to angry expressions and its cognitive neural mechanisms. Eighty-four players (42 participants each with high and low violent virtual avatar experience) were selected to complete the emotional Go/No-go task, during which participants' EEG were recorded. Results indicated that facing angry expressions players with high violent virtual avatar experience showed a greater No-go P3 effect than those with low violent virtual avatar experience. These results suggest that facing angry expressions players with high violent virtual avatar experience show superiority in response inhibition, and this superiority exists in the later stage of response inhibition, which is closely related to the actual inhibition of the motor system.
A great deal of information is extracted from spoken exchanges, independent of content. Indeed, the same information can be conveyed in different manners across time and space in light of the goals of the interlocutors, potentially leading individuals to emphasize, modulate, or mask certain vocal characteristics for social advantages. However, no research has examined our perceptions of the same person speaking two closely related dialects separated by a relatively small geographic distance. The current experiment examined perceptions of the same men asked to speak Scottish Standard English (majority national dialect) versus Dundonian (minority national dialect), focusing on an array of well-studied traits in research on social perceptions. We observed robust positive effects of Scottish Standard English on perceived attractiveness and competence, with almost identical large effect sizes. By shaping perception on some of our measured trait dimensions, dialect may impact perceptions of these men as potential dating partners, allies, and/or leaders. In sum, the same man can be treated differently based on the dialect they switch to, both inadvertently and of the speaker's own volition. These findings can motivate further research into geographic differences in social perception and communication/interaction at both narrow and broad geographic bandwidths.
Models of performance monitoring hold that following an error, the early postresponse period is devoted primarily to error detection rather than mitigation. However, recent evidence shows that erroneous actions can be terminated within ∼100 ms of their initiation. Prior demonstrations of such error cancellation are based on rapid action slips that emerge in highly over-learned tasks, leaving open the question whether error cancellation generalizes to other types of errors. Here, we probed for the generality of the error cancellation effect by studying medium-speed errors that arise from the incorrect application of a mapping rule in the early stages of implementing a novel instruction. Reanalyses of three publicly available datasets show that error cancellation indeed extends to such errors. Swift error cancellation, therefore, is a remarkably general and automatic component of human performance monitoring.
: The Good Behavior Game (GBG) is a widely used classroom management strategy shown to improve student behavior. However, its potential impact on peer relationships remains underexplored. Drawing on Social Identity Theory and the Social Skills Deficit Model, this (quasi-)experimental study investigates how different GBG formats (competitive vs. noncompetitive), team membership (same team vs. different team), and peer-perceived rule compliance influence students' sociometric ratings. A total of n = 609 third- and fourth-grade students from 34 elementary school classes participated. Classes were randomly assigned to either the competitive or the noncompetitive GBG format, with students within each class randomly assigned to one of two GBG teams. The GBG was implemented over 1 week. Sociometric ratings were collected before and after the intervention. Using cross-classified multilevel modeling, results revealed a significant interaction between time of measurement and GBG format. Sociometric ratings increased significantly in classes using the competitive format compared to classes using the noncompetitive format. Contrary to expectations, team membership had no effect on sociometric ratings. As hypothesized, students rated by peers as more compliant with GBG rules showed significantly greater increases in sociometric ratings. The findings highlight the role of a competitive GBG format and student rule compliance in enhancing peer relationships in elementary school classrooms.
Presenting participants with lists of related words (e.g., climb, rock, slope, hike) often elicits false recall and recognition for a related but nonstudied critical lure (CL; mountain). This false memory illusion is often ascribed to the strong associative and/or thematic relations between the related list words and the CL. In the present study, we further evaluated this false memory effect by presenting participants with a list of affordances (e.g., arrange, pick, smell) that were related to a specific object CL (e.g., flower) via a normed database. Affordances refer to specific actions that can be completed with a given object, and the presentation of these actions may result in a false memory for a CL. Each study list was followed by either a free-recall test or a filler arithmetic task and a final recognition test. False memory for the CL was found both in the initial recall test and the final recognition test and was greater following an initial recall test. These data indicate that affordances can produce false memories for related objects which is particularly notable given affordances are verbs and CLs are nouns.
: The term temporal discounting describes people's often-observed preference for smaller, but sooner (SS) rewards over larger, but later (LL) rewards. This discounting effect is reduced when the time period to wait for the LL is expressed as an end date (e.g., April 3) rather than a delay (e.g., 80 days). Several explanations of this Date/Delay Effect have been put forward, one of which is the differential time estimation hypothesis claiming that the duration expressed as an end date is perceived as shorter. The few empirical demonstrations in favor of this view used rating scales for subjective duration judgments that have some methodological shortcomings. To achieve a more comprehensive approach, an objective psychophysical discrimination task was used in the current study. In two online experiments (N = 140 and N = 80), participants made timed decisions comparing which of two periods (one expressed as a date, one expressed as a delay in days) was shorter (or longer). The psychometric functions not only showed a clear bias to view the dates as shorter than the delays, but it could be quantified by estimating the point of subjective equality (PSE) which conformed to a delay-to-date ratio of about 83% and 93% in Studies 1 and 2, respectively. Data and analysis scripts are available at https://osf.io/gmkaj/.
: Transposed-word (TW) effects have been repeatedly observed when comparing responses to two types of ungrammatical sequence of words in a grammatical decision task: 1) transposed-word sequences formed by changing the order of two words in a grammatically correct sentence (e.g., The white was cat big); and 2) ungrammatical control sequences that cannot be transformed into a correct sentence by transposing any two words (e.g., The white was cat slowly). When the task is speeded grammatical decision, and when all words are presented simultaneously in a format that is typical of regular reading, TW effects are observed in both response times (RTs) and error rates. Specifically, responses to the TW sequences are slower and less accurate than to the matched control sequences. However, when written words are presented sequentially, one after the other, then TW effects typically only emerge in error rates. Finally, when the word sequences are presented auditorily, TW effects are significant in both RTs and accuracy. Building on the meta-analysis of TW effects described in Wen and Grainger (2025a), here we present a more detailed analysis of this general pattern and provide a tentative explanation for the observed differences across presentation procedure and modality.
This study investigates the existence and direction of associations between physical stimulus size and vertical response locations. In Experiment 1, 80 participants responded to stimulus size by pressing one of two vertically arranged keys. We orthogonally manipulated within-subjects the mappings between stimulus size and response-key locations, and between hands and response keys. The results showed a novel compatibility effect between physical stimulus size and vertical response location: Responses to the small stimulus were faster at the lower than at the higher location, whereas responses to the large stimulus were faster at the higher than at the lower location. In Experiment 2, we replicated this compatibility effect in vocal responses, when 66 participants responded to stimulus size by saying location words. In combination with previous findings, the present results suggest that the physical size of visual objects is not only associated with horizontal locations but also with vertical locations. These associations presumably reflect learned correlations between the size of objects and their extension in both the horizontal and the vertical direction. Moreover, the observation of size-space compatibility effects in vocal responses may indicate that they do not only reflect sensorimotor experiences but also semantic knowledge, which is expressed in linguistic metaphors.
Our own voice is a very special stimulus, belonging to those we encounter most often. It is an important part of our representation in the world and a key communication tool. Other self-relevant stimuli such as our own name are known for their particularly high attention-grabbing potential, albeit it is unclear whether this is in fact due to their self-relevance or the strong call for action. In this pre-registered conceptual replication study, we compared the disruptive effect of one's own voice to that of another person's voice to investigate whether a self-relevant stimulus without a strong call for action still has the capacity to capture our attention. We used a classic serial recall paradigm with three auditory conditions: (1) A quiet control condition; (2) an own voice condition, in which participants listened to an artificially generated clone of their own voice; and (3) an other voice condition, where participants listened to the voice of their yoked-control partner. We found no difference in recall performance between the own and other voice conditions, suggesting that not all self-relevant stimuli automatically capture our attention, but only those that our cognitive system considers behaviorally relevant at the moment.
In our everyday life, we are constantly exposed to multiple pieces of information from different sources with varying degrees of relevance. It is therefore important to understand whether exposure to information from sources we know to be irrelevant can nevertheless influence us. This study examines this question through the lens of the anchoring effect (Tversky & Kahneman, 1974) by analyzing how numbers provided by sources of varying relevance might influence numerical estimates. In this study, participants answered general knowledge questions after being exposed to either a relevant anchor (from an adult expert), an irrelevant anchor (from a preschooler), or both anchors in succession. The results show that the presence of two opposite anchors, in size and relevance, can reduce the anchoring effect when they are presented consecutively. We discuss the psychological processes underlying this phenomenon.
Musical notes separated by exactly one or more octaves share similarities and, in some respects, might be treated as interchangeable. This octave equivalence is sometimes evident, but in many contexts, is very hard to hear. In two large experiments, participants were asked to judge the similarity of tone pairs, presented sequentially, before and after octave equivalence training. Contrary to some prior research on the topic, it was clearly explained what sort of "similarity" they should rate tone pairs on (i.e., octave equivalence). Each pair consisted of either two tones of the same pitch class but separated by one or more octaves, or two tones of adjacent pitch classes also separated by one or more octaves (±1 semitone). Coherent with past work, this task was difficult. However, both musician and nonmusician samples scored above chance in this task at pretest. Also interestingly, performance improved after training. During the training task, participants also heard pairs of tones but were given the correct response to facilitate learning. Pretest performance and improvements for both groups were not substantial, however, again illustrating the difficulty of hearing octave equivalence, depending on the exact context. Potential relationships to relative and absolute pitch are also briefly discussed.
Risky behaviors and decision making are often experienced in social and group contexts. Understanding how social influence impacts risk preferences is needed to predict how decisions will be made differently in private versus social situations. In this pre-registered study, participants completed three blocks of monetary risky choices in a laboratory setting. In the pre- and postexposure blocks, participants made their choices without receiving any social information. During the intervening exposure block, participants were randomly assigned to observe the choices of either a risk-seeking or risk-avoidant other. Social influence was observed on the choice preferences of individuals, with participants in the risk-seeking condition making significantly riskier decisions during the postexposure block than participants in the risk-avoidant condition. Post hoc analyses revealed that this difference was driven by participants in the risk-seeking other condition significantly increasing their preferences for risky rewards from pre- to postexposure. Exposure to risk-avoidant social information did not significantly reduce preferences for risky rewards. Behavioral social influence was not related to a general social comparison orientation, but those who expressed higher decisional conflict during the pre-exposure block were more likely to adjust their choice preferences following the social exposure. Theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed.
Across two experiments (N = 303), we examined the effect of physical fatigue on moral decision-making. Participants were subjected to acute physical exercise. Half of the participants were presented with moral dilemmas before the physical exercise and the other half after the exercise. We measured moral judgement using a shortened version of the Process Dissociation procedure, allowing us to investigate (1) decisions in the traditional sacrificial dilemmas and (2) deontological and utilitarian moral inclinations. The results showed no significant differences in moral judgments between fatigued and nonfatigued participants in nine out of 10 statistical tests. This suggests a unique resilience of moral judgments to physical fatigue, in contrast to what is known about cognitive fatigue.
In the present study, we investigated transposed-word (TW) effects in the grammatical decision task with auditory stimuli presented at a slow speech rate. We hypothesized that slowing the rate of presentation of speech stimuli should diminish TW effects under the assumption that the encoding of word-order information should be more precise in these conditions. Evidence that this might indeed be the case had already been seen in the visual modality with the serial presentation of word sequences yielding less pronounced TW effects. In these visual studies, the effects were mainly significant in error rates and not in response times (RTs) possibly because serial presentation enhances the precision of word-order encoding. Here, we observed significant TW effects in both RTs and error rates. The present results therefore demonstrate that a slower speech rate does not eliminate TW effects in RTs. These results contradict the hypothesis that a slower speech rate might enhance word-order encoding and further suggest that it is not the serial presentation of stimuli per se that is the only reason for why TW effects are typically not found in RTs in studies that have used serial presentation procedures in the visual modality.
