Hypnotic suggestions can induce rapid change in implicit attitudes

We sometimes evaluate our environment (e.g., persons, objects, situations) in an automatic fashion. These automatic or implicit evaluations are often considered to be based on qualitatively distinct mental processes compared with more controlled or explicit evaluations. Important evidence for this claim comes from studies showing that implicit evaluations do not change as the result of counterattitudinal information, in contrast to their explicit counterparts. We examined the impact of counterattitudinal information on implicit evaluations in two experiments (N = 60, N = 72) that included an innovative manipulation: hypnotic suggestions to participants that they would strongly process upcoming counterattitudinal information. Both experiments indicated that hypnotic suggestions facilitated effects of counterattitudinal information on implicit evaluations. These findings extend recent evidence for rapid revision of implicit evaluations on the basis of counterattitudinal information and support the controversial idea that belief-based processes underlie not only explicit but also implicit evaluations

The influence of high-level beliefs on self-regulatory engagement: evidence from thermal pain stimulation

Determinist beliefs have been shown to impact basic motor preparation, prosocial behavior, performance monitoring, and voluntary inhibition, presumably by diminishing the recruitment of cognitive resources for self-regulation. We sought to support and extend previous findings by applying a belief manipulation to a novel inhibition paradigm that requires participants to either execute or suppress a prepotent withdrawal reaction from a strong aversive stimulus (thermal pain). Action and inhibition responses could be determined by either external signals or voluntary choices. Our results suggest that the reduction of free will beliefs corresponds with a reduction in effort investment that influences voluntary action selection and inhibition, most directly indicated by increased time required to initiate a withdrawal response internally (but not externally). It is likely that disbelief in free will encourages participants to be more passive, to exhibit a reduction in intentional engagement, and to be disinclined to adapt their behavior to contextual needs

The contextual malleability of approach-avoidance training effects : approaching or avoiding fear conditioned stimuli modulates effects of approach-avoidance training

Previous research showed that the repeated approaching of one stimulus and avoiding of another stimulus typically leads to more positive evaluations of the former stimuli. In the current study, we examined whether approach and avoidance training (AAT) effects on evaluations of neutral stimuli can be modulated by introducing a regularity between the approach-avoidance actions and a positive or negative (feared) stimulus. In an AAT task, participants repeatedly approached one neutral non-word and avoided another neutral non-word. Half of the participants also approached a negative fear-conditioned stimulus (CS+) and avoided a conditioned safe stimulus (CS−). The other half of the participants avoided the CS+ and approached the CS−. Whereas participants in the avoid CS+ condition exhibited a typical AAT effect, participants in the approach CS+ condition exhibited a reversed AAT effect (i.e. they evaluated the approached neutral non-word as more negative than the avoided non-word). These findings provide evidence for the malleability of the AAT effect when strongly valenced stimuli are approached or avoided. We discuss the practical and theoretical implications of our findings.© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Grou

Does explaining social behavior require multiple memory systems?

Amodio [1] argues that social cognition research has for many decades relied on imprecise dual-process models that build on questionable assumptions about how people learn and represent information. He presents an alternative framework for explaining social behavior as the product of multiple dissociable memory systems, based on the idea that cognitive neuroscience has revealed evidence for the existence of separate systems underlying distinct forms of learning and memory

Mechanisms underlying effects of approach-avoidance training on stimulus evaluation

Over the past decade an increasing number of studies across a range of domains have shown that the repeated performance of approach and avoidance (AA) actions in response to a stimulus leads to changes in the evaluation of that stimulus. The dominant (motivational-systems) account in this area claims that these effects are caused by a rewiring of mental associations between stimulus representations and AA systems that evolved to regulate distances to positive and negative stimuli. In contrast, two recently forwarded alternative accounts postulate that AA effects are caused by inferences about the valence of actions and stimuli (inferential account) or a transfer of valenced action codes to stimulus representations (common-coding account). Across four experiments we set out to test these three competing accounts against each other. Experiments 1-3 illustrate that changes in stimulus evaluations can occur when people perform valenced actions that bear no relation to a distance regulation, such as moving a manikin upward or downward. The observed evaluative effects were dependent on the evaluative implication of the instructed movement goal rather than whether the action implied a movement toward or away from the stimuli. These results could not be explained with a rewiring of associations to motivational systems. Experiment 4 showed that changes in stimulus evaluations occurred after participants passively observed approach-avoidance movements, supporting an explanation in terms of cognitive inferences

Instructing implicit processes: when instructions to approach or avoid influence implicit but not explicit evaluation

Previous research has shown that linking approach or avoidance actions to novel stimuli through mere instructions causes changes in the implicit evaluation of these stimuli even when the actions are never performed. In two high-powered experiments (total N=1147), we examined whether effects of approach-avoidance instructions on implicit evaluations are mediated by changes in explicit evaluations. Participants first received information about the evaluative properties of two fictitious social groups (e.g., Niffites are good; Luupites are bad) and then received instructions to approach one group and avoid the other group. We observed an effect of approach avoidance instructions on implicit but not explicit evaluations of the groups, even when these instructions were incompatible with the previously obtained evaluative information. These results indicate that approach avoidance instructions allow for unintentional changes in implicit evaluations. We discuss implications for current theories of implicit evaluation. (C) 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

Operant evaluative conditioning

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