In two experiments employing a visual orientation task, the authors investigate the interaction between another person's gaze direction and emotional expression on visual attention. Participants viewed both smiling and frowning schematic faces, with gazes directed either ahead, to the left, or to the right. They subsequently responded to target slides with emotional valences that appeared after gaze onset. Gaze cue validity and expression-target congruity were manipulated. In Experiment 1 participants (n=15) were asked to localize the targets. The results indicated a clear spatial cuing effect due to gaze direction but no effects for facial expression. In Experiment 2 the task for the participants (n=18) was to evaluate the valence of the target slides. The results indicated a significant interaction between gaze and expression, suggesting that expression-target congruity effects are modulated by gaze cue validity. Some theoretical implications are discussed.

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In our previous letter-matching experiments with native English and Japanese readers employing phonograms as stimuli, physical-matching reaction times (RTs) for Japanese readers were the shortest. We hypothesized that the heavy reliance of Japanese readers on visual codes in processing Kanji dominant texts extends to the processing of phonograms, which leads to short visual encoding times. However, all matching RTs at shorter inter-stimulus intervals (ISIs) were prolonged due to some factor other than encoding, making it impossible to determine encoding times based on matching RTs. Assuming this factor to be the time required for attention switching, we measured simple RTs in order to determine attention-switching times in addition to matching RTs in two letter-matching experiments that manipulated the stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) by varying first letter presentation times for alphabetic and Japanese phonograms with English and Japanese readers. Simple RTs were found to be longer at shorter SOAs, which is consistent with our assumption. Net matching RTs calculated by eliminating the time required for attention switching indicated that both visual and phonological encodings by native English readers were completed between 100 ms and 300 ms. In contrast, in native Japanese readers, visual encoding was completed within 100 ms, while phonological encoding required the same amount of time as native English readers, which supports our hypothesis.

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Two experiments investigated whether and how background music (BGM) produces context effects on free recall. A total of 160 undergraduates encoded 20 words while one of four BGM selections was played. In a free recall test of the words conducted 30 seconds after encoding, either the same (same context) or a different (different context) piece of BGM selections was played. Experiment 1 examined the effects of learning intention, the number of repetition, and context. Experiment 2 examined the effects of presentation rate and context in the incidental-learning condition. A BGM-dependent effect was found in the incidental-learning conditions (Experiments 1 and 2), but not in the intentional-learning condition (Experiment 1). In the incidental-learning condition, once-presented words yielded a BGM-dependent effect but twice-presented words did not, and words presented for 4 or 8 seconds both yielded significant effects. The present results indicate that (a) BGM-dependent effects are difficult to be found in the free recall of intentionally-learned words, and (b) repetition and presentation rate, determinants of item strength, do not increase the size of BGM-dependent effects.

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Is emotional information co-activated with visual information when generating mental images? An affective priming paradigm was used to experimentally investigate this question. An affective priming effect was observed in a lexical-decision task that was conducted after image generation for the prime noun in a picture-imagery condition, where the participants visualized the prime noun referent, although attention was only directed to the visual aspects of imagery processes. However, the effect was not observed in a letter-imagery condition where the participants visualized the spelling of the prime noun. These findings suggest that the generation of picture images usually involves the activation of both emotional information and visual information, and that the emotional information evoked by picture images is different from that evoked in word recognition.

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When an item that elicits emotions or is distinctive is inserted within a memory list, memory for the preceding and the subsequent items is often inhibited (retrograde and anterograde amnesia, respectively). The present study demonstrates how this inhibition is related to the arousal of emotions or distinctiveness. A stimulus list consisting of 15 items was employed. The eighth item in the list was a picture that sought to arouse either a pleasant emotion, an unpleasant emotion, or was distinctive, while the other items were all nonsense syllables. Immediately after presentation of the list, participants (undergraduate and graduate students) were asked to freely recall as many of the items as possible. Three experiments were conducted that differed in terms of the exposure durations for the items. Item presentation was for two seconds in Experiment 1 and for four seconds in Experiment 2. In Experiment 3, the eighth item was presented for either one or six seconds, with the remainder being presented for four seconds. The results indicated that while eighth items that were both emotional and distinctive caused anterograde amnesia in Experiment 1, only emotional effects were observed in Experiment 2. In Experiment 3, an unpleasant eighth item caused anterograde amnesia under both the one-second and six-second conditions, but a pleasant item only did so in the one-second condition. No retrograde amnesia was observed in any of the experiments. The relationship between amnesia and attention triggered by emotions and distinctiveness is discussed.

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This study investigates online inferences within script-based texts. The three types of inferences examined relate to causal antecedents (e.g., why did an accident happen?), superordinate goals (e.g., why did he say that?), and subordinate goal-action (e.g., how did she earn so much money?). According to constructionist theory (Graesser, Singer, & Trabasso, 1994), inferences for subordinate goal-actions only occur offline. In this study, participants read script-based texts that are hypothesized to facilitate online inferences due to high levels of contextual constraints. In two conducted experiments, participants read eight stories and undertook a line recognition test. Learning intention was also manipulated (Experiment 2). The results indicate that when a preceding line was deleted, reading times for a target line increased, regardless of inference type or learning intention. Increased latencies for correct rejections and false alarm rates to deleted lines were similarly observed. Inconsistent with constructionist theory, these results suggest that, for script-based texts, inferences for subordinate goal-actions also occur online, just like the other two types of inferences.

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The effects of detailed misinformation about unseen items on false recall are examined. Pairs of participants saw pictures of six scenes. Half of the participants were presented with three critical items that were not seen by the other participants. In a subsequent collaborative recall test, the participant pairs orally reported about items included in each scene. Under an item condition, the participants were asked to recall item names, while under a detail condition, the participants were asked to recall item names, together with information about their colors, shapes, and locations. In this way, the participants who had not seen the critical items would hear misinformation about them during the test. On completion of the test, individual recall tests were conducted, as well as remember/know judgments about the recalled items. The frequencies of false recalls for critical items did not differ under the item and detail conditions. Remember judgments for false recalls were observed in the item condition but not in the detail condition. These results are discussed in terms of source monitoring.

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This paper investigates whether high accessibility to situational self-knowledge facilitates the regulation of negative affect. As an index to the accessibility of situational self-knowledge, Study 1 used the number of responses generated by a participant about themselves in specific situations. The results indicate that participants who generated more situations could regulate naturally occurring negative affect. In Study 2, reaction times in describing one's self in specific situations were employed as the index of accessibility. The results indicated that the participants who made faster self-description responses could were able to regulate the negative affect that was affects induced within the experiment. These findings suggest that accessibility to situational self-knowledge plays a moderating role in the regulation of negative affect. The mechanisms underlying affect regulation that utilize situational self-knowledge are discussed.

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Visual illusion refers to the visual phenomenon where the perception of an object is not consistent with its ‘real’ characteristics. Visual illusions have traditionally been studied within the psychology of perception, because there is relatively little influence of high-order or cognitive processing. In this paper, I present various face illusions and discuss the feasibility of a cognitive psychology of visual illusions.

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