The effect of trypophobic images on conscious awareness during continuous flash suppression

Affective realism, the phenomenon whereby affect is integrated into an individual’s experience of the world, is a normal consequence of how the brain processes sensory information from the external world in the context of sensations from the body. In the present investigation, we provided compelling empirical evidence that affective realism involves changes in visual perception (i.e., affect changes how participants see neutral stimuli). In two studies, we used an interocular suppression technique, continuous flash suppression, to present affective images outside of participants’ conscious awareness. We demonstrated that seen neutral faces are perceived as more smiling when paired with unseen affectively positive stimuli. Study 2 also demonstrated that seen neutral faces are perceived as more scowling when paired with unseen affectively negative stimuli. These findings have implications for real-world situations and challenge beliefs that affect is a distinct psychological phenomenon that can be separated from cognition and perception.

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Unconscious semantic priming from pictures under backward masking and continuous flash suppression

10.31234/osf.io/8sfep ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Timo Stein ◽

Vanessa Utz ◽

Filip Van Opstal

Keyword(s):

Semantic Priming ◽

Statistical Power ◽

Priming Effect ◽

Semantic Processing ◽

Conscious Awareness ◽

Backward Masking ◽

Unconscious Processing ◽

Continuous Flash Suppression ◽

Sufficient Statistical Power ◽

Target Words

It is debated which perceptual functions can take place unconsciously and which depend on conscious awareness. Here, we tested whether the meaning of invisible pictures can be processed unconsciously, and whether this would depend on the psychophysical technique used to render these images invisible. We measured whether pictures of animals or objects presented under backward masking or continuous flash suppression could prime the subsequent categorization of target words into animal or non-animal. The backward masking experiment failed to replicate the priming effect reported in two previous studies, despite sufficient statistical power. Similarly, the continuous flash suppression experiment provided no evidence for a priming effect. Thus, our experiments failed to demonstrate unconscious semantic processing of pictures. These results support the emerging view that unconscious processing is rather limited in scope.

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From 2D to 3D: enhanced access to human conscious awareness

10.31234/osf.io/zpg4x ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Liad Mudrik ◽

Uri Korisky

Keyword(s):

Young Adults ◽

Augmented Reality ◽

3D Printing ◽

Real Life ◽

Conscious Awareness ◽

Continuous Flash Suppression ◽

3D Objects ◽

Real Objects ◽

2D Images ◽

2D To 3D

Most of our interactions with our environment involve manipulating real, 3D objects. Accordingly, 3D objects seem to enjoy preferential processing compared with 2D images, for example in capturing attention or being better remembered. But are they also more readily perceived? Thus far, the possible preferred access of real, 3D objects to awareness could not be empirically tested, as suppression was only applied to on-screen stimuli; Here, using a variant of Continuous Flash Suppression (CFS) with augmented reality goggles (“real-life” CFS), we managed to suppress both real, 3D objects and their 2D representations. In healthy young adults, real objects escaped suppression faster than their photographs. Using 3D printing, we also showed that this only holds for meaningful objects, while no difference was found for meaningless, novel ones. This suggests that the effect is uniquely mediated by affordances, shown here to be evoked by 3D objects even before these emerge to awareness.

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Can a Word Sound Like a Shape Before You Have Seen It? Sound-Shape Mapping Prior to Conscious Awareness

Psychological Science ◽

10.1177/0956797616677313 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 28 (3) ◽

pp. 263-275 ◽

Cited By ~ 23

Author(s):

Shao-Min Hung ◽

Suzy J. Styles ◽

Po-Jang Hsieh

Keyword(s):

Visual Stimuli ◽

Visual Features ◽

Conscious Awareness ◽

Word Form ◽

Continuous Flash Suppression ◽

Auditory Word ◽

Word Forms ◽

Shape Mapping ◽

Different Cultures ◽

Level Of Processing

Nonarbitrary mappings between sound and shape (i.e., the bouba-kiki effect) have been shown across different cultures and early in development; however, the level of processing at which this effect arises remains unclear. Here we show that the mapping occurs prior to conscious awareness of the visual stimuli. Under continuous flash suppression, congruent stimuli (e.g., “kiki” inside an angular shape) broke through to conscious awareness faster than incongruent stimuli. This was true even when we trained people to pair unfamiliar letters with auditory word forms, a result showing that the effect was driven by the phonology, not the visual features, of the letters. Furthermore, visibility thresholds of the shapes decreased when they were preceded by a congruent auditory word form in a masking paradigm. Taken together, our results suggest that sound-shape mapping can occur automatically prior to conscious awareness of visual shapes, and that sensory congruence facilitates conscious awareness of a stimulus being present.

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Impact of conscious awareness on pupillary response to faces

10.1101/2020.11.11.377614 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Yung-Hao Yang ◽

Hsin-I Liao ◽

Shigeto Furukawa

Keyword(s):

Face Processing ◽

Neural Circuits ◽

Pupillary Response ◽

Conscious Awareness ◽

Ambient Light ◽

Continuous Flash Suppression ◽

Pupillary Responses ◽

Objective Performance ◽

The Face ◽

Subjective Reports

AbstractPupillary response reflects not only ambient light changes but also top-down factors. Nevertheless, it remains inconclusive whether the conscious awareness modulates the pupillary response. We investigated pupillary responses to faces under different conscious conditions using continuous flash suppression (CFS). In Experiment 1 and 2, we used a breaking-CFS procedure in which participants had to detect the face from suppression. Results showed that the pupil constricted more to upright faces than to inverted faces before the face was detected, suggesting that pupillary responses reflect face processing entering consciousness. In Experiment 3 and 4, we used a fixed duration-CFS procedure with both objective performance and subjective reports. Different pupillary responses were observed only when the participant was aware of the face. These findings imply that the conscious awareness is critical for modulating autonomic neural circuits of the pupillary function. The corresponding pupillary responses may reflect dynamic processes underlying conscious awareness.

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The Wonder of Self-Reflective Conscious Awareness

Contemporary Psychology ◽

10.1037/029957 ◽

1991 ◽

Vol 36 (7) ◽

pp. 623-624

Author(s):

Mardi J. Horowitz

Keyword(s):

Conscious Awareness

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No impact of affective person knowledge on visual awareness: Evidence from binocular rivalry and continuous flash suppression.

Emotion ◽

10.1037/emo0000305 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 17 (8) ◽

pp. 1199-1207 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Timo Stein ◽

Caitlyn Grubb ◽

Maria Bertrand ◽

Seh Min Suh ◽

Sara C. Verosky

Keyword(s):

Binocular Rivalry ◽

Visual Awareness ◽

Continuous Flash Suppression

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Supplemental Material for Conscious Awareness Differentially Shapes Analgesic and Hyperalgesic Pain Responses

Journal of Experimental Psychology General ◽

10.1037/xge0000759.supp ◽

2020 ◽

Keyword(s):

Conscious Awareness ◽

Pain Responses

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Action and the Problem of Free Will

10.1093/oso/9780198794325.003.0007 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Shaun Gallagher

Keyword(s):

Motor Control ◽

Free Will ◽

Social Contexts ◽

Conscious Awareness ◽

Pure Consciousness ◽

Control Processes ◽

Traditional Notion ◽

Intentional Actions ◽

Neuronal Processes

This chapter examines the concept of free will as it is discussed in philosophy and neuroscience. It reviews reflective and perceptual theories of agency and argues against neuro-centric conclusions about the illusory nature of free will. Experiments conducted by Benjamin Libet suggest that neural activations prior to conscious awareness predict specific actions. This has been taken as evidence that challenges the traditional notion of free will. Libet’s experiments, arguably, are about motor control processes on an elementary timescale and say nothing about freely willed intentional actions embedded in personal and social contexts that involve longer-term, narrative timescales. One implication of this interpretation is that enactivism is not a form of simple behaviorism. Agency is not a thing reducible to elementary neuronal processes; nor is it an idea or a pure consciousness. It rather involves a structure of complex relations.

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