Response Priming Accounts for Self-Prioritization Effects

Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, vol. 79, pp. 795–801

Abstract

Self-prioritization effects found in label-shape matching tasks have been demonstrated extensively. Participants are faster to match label-shape label-shape stimuli against a prelearned mapping, the more self-related the label is. The effect is thought to be driven by special cognitive treatment, saliency, or attentional prioritization of self-referential stimuli. However, the exact underlying mechanism remains elusive. We propose an alternative explanation, namely that self-related labels facilitate matching performance by inducing the so-called self-positivity bias (people tend to represent themselves more positively than they represent others), which is conducive to matching. To test this idea, we skipped the learning of label-shape mappings in our task. Furthermore, we used a shape-shape matching task. Thus, participants did not have to determine whether label-shape combinations match a previously learned mapping, but merely whether two geometrical figures are the same (match) or not (mismatch). Crucially, each trial was preceded by a more or less self-related prime word. This setup enabled us to measure self-prioritization effects in the absence of task directed links between target and self-related stimuli. In Experiment 1, self-related labels ("YOU", "FRIEND", "STRANGER") resulted in faster matching responses. Experiment 2 replicated the effect and ruled out word length as an alternative explanation (prime words: "YOURSELF", "FRIEND", and "OTHER"). Our findings suggest that the self-positivity bias at least contributes to self-prioritization effects. Furthermore, our theory explains interaction effects between match versus mismatch trials and self-relatedness of the labels, as found in many experiments.

Authors 4

1. Stephan A. Verschoor corresponding Aachen Cognitive Psychology Unit Institute of Psychology, Leiden University

   Leiden University · University of Bremen

   Affiliation as printed

   Cognitive Psychology Unit, Institute of Psychology, Leiden University, The Netherlands

   Cognitive Systems Lab, Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Bremen University, Germany

   Cognitive Psychology Unit, Institute of Psychology, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands

   Cognitive Systems Lab, Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Bremen University, Bremen, Germany

2. Asmin Yurtsever Aachen Cognitive Psychology Unit Institute of Psychology, Leiden University

   Leiden University

   Affiliation as printed

   Cognitive Psychology Unit, Institute of Psychology, Leiden University, The Netherlands

   Cognitive Psychology Unit, Institute of Psychology, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands

3. Tanja Schultz

   University of Bremen

   Affiliation as printed

   Cognitive Systems Lab, Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Bremen University, Germany

   Cognitive Systems Lab, Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Bremen University, Bremen, Germany

4. Bernhard Hommel

   Shandong Normal University

   Affiliation as printed

   Faculty of Psychology, Shandong Normal University, Jinan, China