Journal of Experimental Psychology-Human Perception and Performance最新文献

The ability to adjust behavior in an adaptive manner is critical for functioning and has been linked to the metacognitive processes of monitoring and controlling cognition. A prominent behavioral adjustment is post-error slowing (PES): the increased reaction time typically observed after an individual makes an error. There has been widespread debate regarding whether PES is an adaptive behavior that reflects top-down control processes or nonadaptive behavior that reflects bottom-up attention orientation. An adaptive behavior should positively impact goal-directed performance. However, there are mixed findings as to whether PES improves task performance. Here, we proposed an alternative approach by investigating PES in self-paced preparation time. Adjustments in self-paced preparation improve performance and have been linked to metacognition, but these relationships have not been explored for post-error adjustments. Data were collected from 2022 to 2023 in 139 adolescents (11-15 years) and 140 adult participants (18-35 years). Participants demonstrated significant preparation time slowing following errors in a task-switch paradigm. Importantly, post-error preparation slowing magnitude was positively related to better performance (accuracy, reaction time, and switch cost) and to enhanced metacognition/strategic knowledge. This shows that post-error preparation slowing is adaptive and is related to individual differences in participants' metacognition, in both adolescent and adult populations. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Speech perception gradiency reflects sensitivity to subphonemic differences. Prior research has shown that gradiency facilitates recovery from misperceptions (i.e., speech perception flexibility) in L1 (Kapnoula et al., 2021), but whether and how gradiency contributes to speech perception flexibility in L2 remains unknown. This study investigated the role of gradiency in spoken-word recognition among Spanish (L1)-English (L2) bilinguals. Gradiency was assessed using a Visual Analogue Scale with stop consonants (/b/-/p/), and initial activation of a lexical competitor and speech perception flexibility were assessed using an eye-tracking Visual World Paradigm task. Seventy Spanish-English bilinguals completed these tasks in both languages. Following previous results in L1 English, gradiency facilitated speech perception flexibility in L1 Spanish. In contrast, gradiency did not facilitate L2 speech perception; instead, a different pattern emerged: participants relied more heavily on lexical (top-down) than subphonemic (bottom-up) information, as would be expected given the less robust category representations in L2. In addition, a positive correlation between L1 and L2 gradiency was observed only among higher-proficiency listeners. Overall, these findings suggest that the functional role of gradiency in L1 versus L2 speech perception is modulated by the differential reliance on bottom-up versus top-down information. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Speech sounds are based on categories, but listeners are also sensitive to within-category acoustic variation. This gradient system helps promote flexibility, deal with ambiguity, and maintain plasticity. Although the exact sources of gradiency are not well understood, prior work suggests that it may be a product of statistical learning: Listeners exposed to more variable input show shallower categorization slopes. However, the tasks used in earlier work are ambiguous regarding what this slope represents. We investigated the role of phonetic variability as a causal driver of gradiency across three experiments, using a distributional learning paradigm in conjunction with the Visual Analog Scale task, which resolves this ambiguity. In 2024, participants were trained on distributions of voice onset time with either high or low variance, and gradiency was assessed using the Visual Analog Scale task. Experiment 1 (n = 84) suggested that variance increased trial-by-trial inconsistency, not gradiency. Experiment 2 (n = 168) used 28 items to better generalize across stimulus characteristics and found robust evidence for increased gradiency due to variability. Experiment 3 (n = 85) introduced a baseline (no learning) condition and ruled out the alternative explanation that listeners were adapting to low variance by becoming less gradient. Together, these support the idea that variable input promotes gradiency. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Alertness plays a critical role in sensory processing, yet the extent to which phasic (transient) and tonic (sustained) alertness interact in shaping attention and cognitive control of attention (top-down control) remains unclear. We report two preregistered experiments, designed to disentangle and examine the specific effects of phasic and tonic alerting on distinct attentional processes, independent of motor responses. Using a phasic/tonic/no-alerting design with a purely accuracy-based letter recognition task, we apply computational modeling to analyze whether alerting influences perceptual thresholds, processing speed, visual short-term memory, spatial weighting, and top-down control. Results show that phasic alerting significantly enhances visual processing speed without affecting other attentional parameters, including top-down control. These results suggest that, in the absence of motor confounds, the interaction between alerting and cognitive control may be more limited than previously assumed in Posner and colleagues' attention network theory. In addition, results show that exposure to phasic alerting does not influence tonic alertness levels. This dissociation establishes a novel, methodological framework for isolating phasic alerting effects in attentional tasks, free from tonic confounds. Our findings highlight the distinct role of phasic alerting in accelerating visual processing globally rather than selectively, thus advancing our understanding of attentional dynamics in complex environments. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

It is commonly assumed that people can use advance cues to proactively prepare for conflict from distracting stimulus features, yet empirical findings remain inconsistent. We tested the hypothesis that nonarbitrary stimulus-response (S-R) mappings are a key determinant of cue effectiveness, as vocal Stroop tasks (with nonarbitrary color-naming responses) have shown reliable cue benefits, whereas manual Stroop tasks (with arbitrary key press responses) typically have not. Across five experiments, using a spatial Stroop task with nonarbitrary S-R mappings, we consistently found no evidence that participants used predictive cues to proactively resolve conflict on incongruent trials. Despite providing optimal preparation conditions (100% valid cues, 2,000 ms preparation time), cue benefits only emerged on congruent trials when task difficulty was increased substantially (50 ms stimulus presentation, Experiment 4), likely reflecting a strategic shortcut rather than enhanced proactive control. These findings demonstrate that nonarbitrary S-R mappings are not a sufficient condition for ensuring cue-based engagement of proactive control and challenge the assumption that this form of control is a readily deployable, domain-general mechanism. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

This study investigated how observers compute the average attractiveness of groups of faces with different identities, presented via rapid serial visual presentation. In Experiment 1, participants rated the average attractiveness of group faces, revealing a recency effect where the last face had the greatest influence. In Experiments 2 and 3, participants compared the average attractiveness of groups (with members presented in ascending, random, or descending attractiveness order) against either the arithmetic-average face (AAF; where each member contributes equally) or the weighted-average face (WAF; using recency-based weights from Experiment 1; tested only in Experiment 3). Presentation order influenced judgments for AAFs but not for WAFs; furthermore, this confirms that rapid serial visual presentation-based group-attractiveness perception relies on weighted processing incorporating the recency effect. In Experiment 4, participants rated the average attractiveness of group faces, the attractiveness of group member faces, and AAF/WAFs, and completed a memory task. The results showed that participants estimate group-average attractiveness by combining individual members' attractiveness through a weighted average, rather than by matching it to the attractiveness of the WAF itself. The recency effect observed in the memory task suggests that the recency effect in ensemble perception of facial attractiveness may reflect broader principles of memory encoding that are based on postperceptual processing. These findings offer novel perspectives on the mechanisms of group-attractiveness perception and have potential implications for group impression formation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

The visual system can encode many stimuli simultaneously, but there are limits to how well multiple objects can be identified in parallel. At the extreme, some objects might have to be identified serially. The redundant target paradigm is one tool for distinguishing specific parallel and serial models. It compares responses to displays containing one target versus displays containing two targets. The typical result is a positive redundant target effect: faster correct responses to two targets, as predicted by many parallel models. Here, we generalize three standard models to account for response accuracy as well as speed. Surprisingly, two models predict a reversal of the redundant target effect (slower responses to two targets than to one target): the generalized standard serial model and a specific form of a fixed-capacity parallel model. To test that prediction, we measured performance for three different judgments of written words: color detection, lexical decision, and semantic categorization. The color task yielded positive redundant target effects, which reject the standard serial model. The semantic task yielded consistently negative effects, which are consistent with either the standard serial model or some limited-capacity parallel models. Thus, redundant targets can have negative effects, and they demonstrate limits that impair simultaneous recognition of two words. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Perceived or actual time limits can negatively affect performance of motor tasks. Based on the integrative framework of stress, attention, and visuomotor performance, time pressure should affect visuomotor performance outcomes if it prompts, in turn, perceiving demands to exceed resources, a state of threat, and distractibility. We put this framework to a partial test by examining whether subjective distress, a marker of a state of threat, is a mechanism by which time pressure affects performance in two online studies (Ns = 93 and 148; 2022) of adults in the United States. Participants completed a route planning and tracing task in which we manipulated time pressure using a within-subjects urgency messaging (UM) manipulation. We measured subjective distress and fine motor behavior indexing information processing efficiency, route efficiency, and accuracy. We partitioned the total of effects of UM on performance into indirect and direct pathways and meta-analyzed them. In indirect pathways, UM increased distress which hampered information processing efficiency and route efficiency, but not accuracy. In direct pathways, UM increased information processing efficiency and route efficiency and decreased accuracy. The total effect of UM was to increase information processing efficiency but not route efficiency, and decrease accuracy. In sum, consistent with the integrative framework of stress, attention, and visuomotor performance, perceived time pressure affects visuomotor performance efficiency in part because it elicits subjective distress. Overall, these studies highlight the importance of modeling mechanisms and the utility of assessing two forms of performance efficiency and the effectiveness of fine motor behavior. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

Recent research has highlighted the importance of information about adiposity in the visual perception of both bodies and faces. Behavioral and neuroimaging studies have demonstrated the existence of category-selective visual representations of faces and bodies, as well as integrated whole-person representations. It remains unknown whether visual perception of adiposity arises from category-selective or whole-person mechanisms. Here, we show that whole-person representations are involved by showing cross-category transfer of adaptation aftereffects to adiposity between faces and bodies. In Experiment 1, we demonstrate that adaptation to a gaunt face biases judgments of subsequently presented faces, complementing previous research demonstrating adiposity aftereffects in bodies. We then demonstrate cross-category transfer of such aftereffects from faces to bodies (Experiments 2 and 3) and from bodies to faces (Experiment 4). Cross-category transfer, however, was substantially weaker than within-category transfer and was not consistently observed across all individual conditions. A control study (Experiment 5) showed no adaptation when adapting face stimuli were inverted, suggesting that the effects are unlikely to result from nonspecific low-level features of the stimuli. These results demonstrate functional interactions between visual representations of faces and bodies in the perception of adiposity, suggesting the involvement of integrated whole-person representations. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).

The sense of agency is a fundamental aspect of human experience. Temporal binding, the subjective compression of the perceived time interval between an action and its outcome, has previously been assumed to be an implicit measure of the sense of agency. Here, we investigate whether the characteristic directionality of the temporal binding effect is consistently present at the individual level. We first deaggregated the data from three temporal binding data sets and systematically reanalyzed and revisualized these effects at the individual level. This analysis revealed consistent differences in the directionality of the temporal binding effect at the individual level. We next implemented a validated Bayes factor mixed-method modeling approach (Rouder & Haaf, 2021), which simulated individual true effects in two additional data sets and determined that the observed differences in directionality remained after accounting for sampling noise. Model comparison determined that the least constrained model, that is, the one that allowed for individual differences in the magnitude and directionality of the effect, was the best fitting model. These results provide strong support for the presence of qualitative differences in the temporal binding effect. Implications for both the theoretical and applied future of this literature are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).