S1 (FriAM 1-65) - The Psychonomic Society

Papers 223–229 Saturday Afternoon
2:50–3:05 (223)
Testing the Whorfian Hypothesis: Lateralized Presentation and
Color Recognition. CLARK G. OHNESORGE, Carleton College,
GEORGE KACHERGIS, Indiana University, & AARON FANTA,
Epic Systems—In recent years, several papers report effects consistent
with the Whorfian hypothesis, the claim that one’s language exerts
an influence on perceptual and cognitive tasks. Generally it is unclear
whether the asserted influence of language is on early
(perceptual) processes or later (decisional) processes. Using a lateralized
color detection task we replicate the findings of a representative
paper, (Gilbert, Regier, Kay, & Ivry, PNAS, 2006) and extend
them through a modification of the basic task in a design that uses response
time as the dependent variable. Our findings support their conclusion
that language seems to exert an influence in this task. We also
present data from a study employing a 2AFC task allowing a strong
test of the claim that linguistic influence exerts itself at the perceptual
level. In this task we find no evidence to support the claim of an influence
of language at the perceptual level.
Multisensory Integration and Auditory Perception
Shoreline, Saturday Afternoon, 1:30–3:10
Chaired by Adele A. Diederich, Jacobs University
1:30–1:45 (224)
Too Old to Integrate? A Cross-Modal Study With the Elderly.
ADELE A. DIEDERICH, Jacobs University, & HANS COLONIUS,
Oldenburg University—Saccadic reaction time (SRT) to visual targets
tends to be faster when auditory stimuli occur in close temporal or
spatial proximity even when subjects are instructed to ignore the nontarget
(focused attention paradigm). Here it is investigated whether
this facilitation is modulated by the subjects’ age. One group consisted
of college students (age: 20–23 years), the other of elderly (age:
65–75 years). Auditory nontargets (white noise) were presented 100,
50, or 0 msec before or 50 msec after the visual target (LED). Mean
SRT of the elderly was about twice as long as for the college students.
Multisensory response enhancement (MRE), a measure of relative
speed-up of responses in the bimodal versus the visual-alone condition,
was larger for the elderly. The time-window-of-integration
(TWIN) model for multisensory integration in SRT, developed by the
authors, is utilized to disentangle the effects of peripheral sensory processing
from multisensory integration efficiency.
1:50–2:05 (225)
Neural Correlates of Multisensory Integration of Ecologically Valid
Audiovisual Events. JEAN VROOMEN & JEROEN STEKELEN-
BURG, Tilburg University—A question that has emerged over recent
years is whether audiovisual (AV) speech perception is a special case
of multisensory perception. Electrophysiological (ERP) studies have
found that auditory neural activity (N1 component of the ERP) induced
by speech is suppressed and speeded up when a speech sound is accompanied
by concordant lip movements. In Experiment 1, we show
that this AV interaction is not speech-specific. Ecologically valid nonspeech
AV events (actions performed by an actor such as handclapping)
were associated with a similar speeding up and suppression of auditory
N1 amplitude as AV speech (syllables). Experiment 2 demonstrated that
these AV interactions were not influenced by whether A and V were
congruent or incongruent. In Experiment 3 we show that the AV interaction
on N1 was absent when there was no anticipatory visual motion,
indicating that the AV interaction only occurred when visual anticipatory
motion preceded the sound. These results demonstrate that the visually
induced speeding-up and suppression of auditory N1 amplitude
reflect multisensory integrative mechanisms of AV events that crucially
depend on whether vision predicts when the sound occurs.
2:10–2:25 (226)
Apparent Causality and Audio-Visual Synchrony Perception.
ROB L. J. VAN EIJK, Eindhoven University of Technology, ARMIN
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KOHLRAUSCH, Philips Research Laboratories and Eindhoven University
of Technology, JAMES F. JUOLA, University of Kansas and
Eindhoven University of Technology, & STEVEN VAN DE PAR, Philips
Research Laboratories (read by James F. Juola)—In audio-visual synchrony
perception, the proportion of “synchronous” responses is not
symmetric around physical synchrony, but centers around an audio
delay called the point of subjective simultaneity (PSS). We investigated
whether an observer's causal interpretation influences the PSS.
We used an animation of Newton’s Cradle, showing a left-to-right pendulum
movement, in three conditions: (1) the entire stimulus, (2) the
left half, or (3) the right half. In Conditions 1 and 2, the visual movement
appeared to cause a collision sound, whereas in Condition 3 the
sound appeared to cause the visual movement. Conditions 1 and 2
yielded typical PSSs, whereas for Condition 3, perceptual synchrony
coincided with physical synchrony. Opposite results were found using
a temporal-order judgment (TOJ) paradigm. Such response shifts indicate
that PSSs found in synchrony judgment experiments are influenced
by apparent causal relations between auditory and visual stimuli,
whereas TOJs are driven by strategies that are at best indirectly
related to perceived causality.
2:30–2:45 (227)
Are Valid Auditory Cues Helpful? ADAM J. REEVES & BERTRAM
SCHARF, Northeastern University—We asked whether a valid cue,
one that indicates the frequency of an upcoming auditory signal, helps
detection. Forty millisecond signals and cues were presented in continuous
50- or 60-dB noise. Signals were near threshold, and cues 4
to 8 dB above. A valid frequency cue presented just before a signal of
uncertain frequency reduces the well-known deleterious effect of frequency
uncertainty. However, when signal frequency is certain, the
cue interferes with detection over the next 100 msec or so by up to 2
to 3 dB. This “forward interference” effect is about the same whether
the cue is ipsi- or contralateral to the signal, so is not forward masking,
and it is less for invalid cues. Attending to the cue apparently not
only aids focusing on the critical band containing the upcoming signal,
but also interferes by absorbing processing resources that otherwise
would go to the signal.
2:50–3:05 (228)
Hypervigilance Does Not Increase the Loudness of Unpleasant
Sounds. MARK HOLLINS, DANIEL E. HARPER, SHANNON M.
GALLAGHER, & WILLIAM MAIXNER, University of North Carolina,
Chapel Hill—Hypervigilance, a feature of some chronic pain
conditions such as fibromyalgia and temporomandibular joint disorder
(TMJD), is a heightened attentiveness to, and perhaps a perceptual
amplification of, painful sensations. McDermid et al. (1996) proposed,
mainly on the basis of noise tolerance data, that this
amplification may extend to aversive stimuli that are not painful. To
test directly the idea that hypervigilance involves an increase in perceived
intensity of painless but aversive stimuli, we asked individuals
with TMJD (n = 10), and healthy control subjects (n = 11), to estimate
the loudness of auditory stimuli (two-tone combinations) ranging
from soft to unpleasantly loud (35–90 dB SPL). Although the TMJD
subjects were significantly more hypervigilant than the controls based
on questionnaire (PILL) responses, the loudness estimates of the two
groups were equivalent across the intensity range. The results indicate
that hypervigilance need not be accompanied by an increase in the
subjective intensity of all aversive stimuli.
Face Processing
Regency ABC, Saturday Afternoon, 4:10–5:30
Chaired by K. Suzanne Scherf, University of Pittsburgh
4:10–4:25 (229)
Developmental Trajectory of Visual Object Recognition Revealed by
fMRI. K. SUZANNE SCHERF, University of Pittsburgh, MARLENE
BEHRMANN, Carnegie Mellon University, KATE HUMPHREYS,