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Subliminal Affect Valence Words Change Conscious Mood Potency but Not Valence: Is This Evidence for Unconscious Valence Affect?

Whether or not affect can be unconscious remains controversial. Research claiming to demonstrate unconscious affect fails to establish clearly unconscious stimulus conditions. The few investigations that have established unconscious conditions fail to rule out conscious affect changes. We report two...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Shevrin, Howard, Panksepp, Jaak, Brakel, Linda A. W., Snodgrass, Michael
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2012
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4061819/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24961258
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci2040504
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author Shevrin, Howard
Panksepp, Jaak
Brakel, Linda A. W.
Snodgrass, Michael
author_facet Shevrin, Howard
Panksepp, Jaak
Brakel, Linda A. W.
Snodgrass, Michael
author_sort Shevrin, Howard
collection PubMed
description Whether or not affect can be unconscious remains controversial. Research claiming to demonstrate unconscious affect fails to establish clearly unconscious stimulus conditions. The few investigations that have established unconscious conditions fail to rule out conscious affect changes. We report two studies in which unconscious stimulus conditions were met and conscious mood changes measured. The subliminal stimuli were positive and negative affect words presented at the objective detection threshold; conscious mood changes were measured with standard manikin valence, potency, and arousal scales. We found and replicated that unconscious emotional stimuli produced conscious mood changes on the potency scale but not on the valence scale. Were positive and negative affects aroused unconsciously, but reflected consciously in potency changes? Or were the valence words unconscious cognitive causes of conscious mood changes being activated without unconscious affect? A thought experiment is offered as a way to resolve this dilemma.
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spelling pubmed-40618192014-06-19 Subliminal Affect Valence Words Change Conscious Mood Potency but Not Valence: Is This Evidence for Unconscious Valence Affect? Shevrin, Howard Panksepp, Jaak Brakel, Linda A. W. Snodgrass, Michael Brain Sci Article Whether or not affect can be unconscious remains controversial. Research claiming to demonstrate unconscious affect fails to establish clearly unconscious stimulus conditions. The few investigations that have established unconscious conditions fail to rule out conscious affect changes. We report two studies in which unconscious stimulus conditions were met and conscious mood changes measured. The subliminal stimuli were positive and negative affect words presented at the objective detection threshold; conscious mood changes were measured with standard manikin valence, potency, and arousal scales. We found and replicated that unconscious emotional stimuli produced conscious mood changes on the potency scale but not on the valence scale. Were positive and negative affects aroused unconsciously, but reflected consciously in potency changes? Or were the valence words unconscious cognitive causes of conscious mood changes being activated without unconscious affect? A thought experiment is offered as a way to resolve this dilemma. MDPI 2012-10-17 /pmc/articles/PMC4061819/ /pubmed/24961258 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci2040504 Text en © 2012 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Shevrin, Howard
Panksepp, Jaak
Brakel, Linda A. W.
Snodgrass, Michael
Subliminal Affect Valence Words Change Conscious Mood Potency but Not Valence: Is This Evidence for Unconscious Valence Affect?
title Subliminal Affect Valence Words Change Conscious Mood Potency but Not Valence: Is This Evidence for Unconscious Valence Affect?
title_full Subliminal Affect Valence Words Change Conscious Mood Potency but Not Valence: Is This Evidence for Unconscious Valence Affect?
title_fullStr Subliminal Affect Valence Words Change Conscious Mood Potency but Not Valence: Is This Evidence for Unconscious Valence Affect?
title_full_unstemmed Subliminal Affect Valence Words Change Conscious Mood Potency but Not Valence: Is This Evidence for Unconscious Valence Affect?
title_short Subliminal Affect Valence Words Change Conscious Mood Potency but Not Valence: Is This Evidence for Unconscious Valence Affect?
title_sort subliminal affect valence words change conscious mood potency but not valence: is this evidence for unconscious valence affect?
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4061819/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24961258
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/brainsci2040504
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