Comparison of dynamically and statically presented subliminal cue information in insight problem solving

Abstract

Previous studies have suggested that implicit information processing plays an important role in insight problem solving. However, some studies reported that when subliminal hint information was presented in sequential order, performance did not improve. On the other hand, recent research has found that sequential presentation of subliminal cues and motor information induced by illusory line motion improved performance. However, the improvement might not be due to the motion information but to the mere presentation of the cues. In order to test this possibility, we conducted an experiment that consisted of three conditions (dynamic, static, and control). The results showed that the dynamic condition outperformed the other conditions, which suggested the crucial role of motion information, at least in insight problems requiring sequential operations.