文章基本信息

标题：The power of the mental number line: how the magnitude of unattended numbers affects performance in an Eriksen task
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作者：HANS-CHRISTOPH NUERK ; FRANK BAUER ; JOSEPH KRUMMENACHER 等
期刊名称：Psychology Science
印刷版ISSN：1614-9947
出版年度：2005
卷号：47
期号：01
出版社：Pabst Science Publishers
摘要：Number magnitude is known to be activated even when it is irrelevant. However, little is known about whether and how this automatic number magnitude activation is attentionally used to select relevant information and to inhibit irrelevant information.
In an Eriksen paradigm, we investigated this issue in a magnitude comparison task with the standard 5. First, we replicated the usual attentional congruency effects for numbers. When the distractors would lead to a response which is incongruent with the correct response to the target, participants were slow. Second, we observed the common number magnitude (distance and SNARC) effects for the target number, but generally failed to find such effects for distractors. Finally, we found evidence that participants could not help making a dysfunc-tional second order magnitude comparison in which they compared the target with the to-be-inhibited distractor.
The results seem to suggest that it is not the magnitude of the distractors themselves which determined performance, but their relation to target magnitude. This relation seems to be used in a functional way to enhance attentional selection and inhibition processes. In line with results from other paradigms (Fischer, Castel, Dodd, & Pratt, 2003) we conclude that the automaticity of number magnitude processing and its influence on attentional selection and inhibition procedures should not be underestimated.
关键词：mental number line, SNARC, MARC, Eriksen, attention, distance effect