Non-conscious Processes in Perception, Emotion, and Movement

Skeptic’s Toolbox 2004 The University of Oregon

Barry Beyerstein Brain Behaviour Laboratory Department of Psychology Simon Fraser University

Do we have access to the causes of our feelings and our behaviour? The Doctrine of Concordance

n The term used by the psychologist Endel Tulving to describe the age-old n Always? tenet of folk-psychology that consci- ous awareness always accompanies (and is always necessary for) percep- tion, memory, decision-making, and n Never? for the enactment and control of our behavior. Endel Tulving, University of Toronto n The notion that we always know what we are doing and why (i.e., what the n Sometimes? causes were)

1 Is introspection a reliable guide A two-pronged attack on the to what is controlling validity of introspection our behaviors?

n Wilhelm Wundt (1832- 1920) and the struc- turalists held that Ivan Pavlov introspection was a (1849-1936) valid procedure for John B. Watson observing the workings (1878-1958) B.F. Skinner of one’s own mind. (1904-1990) Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) BEHAVIORISM PSYCHOANALYSIS

STIMULUS- RESPONSE PSYCHOLOGY

“Everything is concave or convex, so everything has something to do with sex.”

Peit Hein: Ode to Freud

2 The Modern View of the Evidence for Unconscious Non-conscious Processing

n Although most psychologists and neuro- n Implicit versus explicit knowledge scientists reject both Freud’s peculiar n Performance of highly practiced (“overlearned”) behaviors---e.g., driving, sports and dance movements conceptualization of the unconscious and the n “Blindsight” and prosopagnosia Behaviorists’ dismissal of any causal role for n Ideomotor activities conscious awareness, there is much compelling n Semantic priming effects clinical and experimental evidence to support n Non-conscious effects of unattended stimuli on the claim that much of what we do is choices, moods, social behaviours, etc. influenced, planned, chosen, and initiated by n Conditioning (learning) without awareness brain processes operating outside of n The “mere exposure effect” conscious awareness. n Source amnesia and cryptomnesia n The Implicit Associations Test n Dissociated behaviors, automatisms

An Information Processing / Selective Attention Model of the Mind. Kenneth Bowers University of Waterloo

n First-Order Consciousness (~Farthing’s “Primary Consciousness”) n Found in all higher mammals n Awareness of events due to attending to them or “noticing” them

n Second-Order Consciousness (~Farthing’s “Reflective Consciousness”) n Awareness of being aware n Comprehension of things that have been noticed n Integrates beliefs, knowledge, concepts, theories G. William Farthing about how the world works (1992)

3 Consciousness evolved with successively Bowers more complex brains

“A given behaviour has a variety of potential Second-Order Consc. determinants, at least some of which are readily noticeable. First-Order However, whatever is Consc . represented or noticed in first-order conscious- ness never entails a particular understanding of it in second-order consciousness.”

4 The modularity of consciousness: Different specialized “mod- ules” can work in the background without conscious awareness Let’s talk about perception

Even relatively simple The visual system encodes perceptions are complex relatively few key details from cognitive constructions the retinal stimulus, which are then “filled in” by the brain, n They are not just a one-to -one rendition using inference and of what’s on the retina n “Perception is sensory reasoning.” information from memory n That reasoning, inferring, etc., is done about what we know about how unconsciously, before the final result is served up to conscious awareness. the world usually works.

5 What did you just see?

Answer: 2 Bill Clintons

6 BLINDSIGHT Stuff going on in the visual system that we’re n Lawrence Weiskrantz, not aware of University of Oxford

“Blindsight”

Lesions in the visual cortex that can cause hemianopsias or scotomata

7 Testing for Blindsight

1. Determine extent of blind area

2. Present stimuli in the blind part of the visual field Pointing at objects inside the blind spot (that the patients cannot see 3. Require a behavioral consciously) is more accurate than the hit rate predicted by chance. response; e.g., pointing

How could such a thing happen? We have several visual systems

8 There’s even another branch of the visual system that controls our biological clock WHERE?

WHAT?

EVIDENCE FOR SIMILAR NON-CONSCIOUS PROCESSESSING OF INFORMATION IN NON- BRAIN INJURED PEOPLE?

9 Mel Goodale, When people who can’t see their hand Univ. of Western and reach out to grasp the 3-D stimulus Ontario that LOOKS to be a different size because of the visual illusion, they still position the gap between their fingers to match the REAL size of the cylinder.

10 PROSOPAGNOSIA n Loss of the ability to recognize faces without the loss of visual ability in general

Could part of the brain still be able to recognize faces, even though there is no conscious awareness of their familiarity?

Antonio Damasio University of Iowa

11 Polygraphs ARE sensitive detectors of A.N.S. responses

Half the faces were familiar; half were novel.

Autonomic Nervous System

In Tranel and Damasio’s experiment n The prosopagnosic patients couldn’t recognize SOME EXAMPLES OF faces of people who were quite familiar to them n At the same time they NON-CONSCIOUS were denying they knew who the familiar faces were, their autonomic INFLUENCES ON nervous systems were showing a bigger response on the polygraph to the BEHAVIOUR familiar faces than they BEHAVIOUR gave to non-familiar faces—all without the patients’awareness

12 The mere exposure effect

n Robert Zajonc, University of Michigan n Kunst-Wilson, W. R. and Zajonc, R. B. (1980). Affective discrimination of stimuli that cannot be recognized. Science, 207, 557-558

unconscious odor conditioning

The nose knows . . .

13 UNCONSCIOUS ODOR The Warwick Lab CONDITIONING

n Set out to determine if unconscious conditioning to unobtrusive odors in the environment can produce subtle effects on n Kirk-Smith, Van Toller, & Dodd mood or emotions at some later time University of Warwick, U.K. (unbeknownst to the person experiencing these feelings). n Biological Psychology, 1983, Vol. 17, pp. 221-231 n To say that the conditioning was unconscious, after the experiment, people must report having had no awareness of the smell when they were exposed to it earlier and/or no awareness that it had in any way affected their emotional responses at the later time.

n Experimental demonstration of the uncon- scious odor conditioning effect requires a subtle, relatively neutral (neither "good" nor "bad"), smell that people in the study are n Two sessions, ostensibly unrelated to unlikely to have been exposed to before. one another, one announced as a n The Warwick group chose TUA (Trimethyl- problem-solving experiment, the second undecylenic aldehyde, a neutral "base" used in one (about a week later) was billed as a the perfume industry) task requiring rating of one’s own n They subtly insinuated TUA, unannounced, into the room environment for half their emotions and those being expressed in participants during the first session. photographs of people’s faces. n There was a "sham task“ in the first session to divert attention from the real independent and dependent variables.

14 SESSION ONE: TASK ONE: SESSION TWO: n Problem solving task n Occurred about a week later, seemingly done with the subtle odor of TUA present unrelated to the first experiment: different for half the partici - experimenters, different lab room, different pants. The odor was weak; no attention was task, etc. drawn to it. n TASK TWO: n Very difficult problems to solve. n 1. Complete a self-report mood scale before n Participants were treat- and after the photo -judging task. ed brusquely. n They were frustrated, n 2. Rate the emotions being expressed in a angry, and made to feel series of facial photographs. inadequate for not performing better.

Pictures such as these would have been eliminated RESULTS:

n In the second session, participants who had the odor present in both sessions tended to rate their own mood, and the emotions supposedly depicted in the photos, more n Participants did not know that the negatively than those who did not have TUA pictures had actually been pre-selected present during the emotionally-disturbing to remove any photos that a previous first session. group of judges had rated as showing n Debriefing subjects after Session Two revealed very little awareness of ever having any emotion smelled TUA before or that it had anything n In session two, all the experimental to do with the purposes of the experiments in subjects had the TUA odor present in which they had participated. the room.

15 n The authors concluded that subtle Follow-up Experiment conditioning of odors to emotional situational variables can occur without n Van Toller and Dodd used a similar experimental para- awareness. digm, but this time the n When these odor stimuli are encountered measure was autonomic nervous system response to later, they may "reinstate" part of the the unconscious odour negative emotional state without the (similar to Damasio’s experi- ment with prosopagnosics) experiencer knowing where it came from. n In this experiment, people n My extension: This may be a common showed heightened emotional responses on the polygraph source of vague feelings, premonitions, to TUA that had been unexplained attractions, repulsions, present but unnoticed in a previous, emotionally unset- emotional reactions, subtle and sudden tling situation. changes in moods, etc., in everyday life.

How might it work?

16 Enough smell stuff already . . . One of the jobs of consciousness is to make as many operations as possible unconscious

The capacity of “focal PRACTICE awareness” is limited

n Conscious decision- making and monitoring of behaviour is reserved for novel tasks that require moment-to- moment attention (feedback control). n As a task is practiced and mastered it becomes automatized; i.e., a habit that can be controlled outside of awareness.

17 Probably the most familiar Automatic Behaviours example is driving an automobile. n Over-learned “programs” that can n When you are learning, it requires rapt operate autonomously (outside attention to every aspect of the process. awareness) n Eventually, it becomes so routine that we can “multi -task”; i.e., drive and attend to other n This frees the self-aware “executive things---as long as the driving task demands level” of consciousness to attend to remain routine. problem solving, long-range planning, n We may have to switch back from automatic escapist fantasies, self-gratification… to controlled processing if a novel demand presents itself.

Once a behavioural routine has become automatized . . .

n Drawing attention to it or asking a person to attempt to control it voluntarily usually results in a deteriora - tion rather than an improvement in the behaviour.

18 Ballistic movements in sports

If a batter has to see the ball thrown and decide whether and how to swing, IT’S ALREADY TOO LATE

19 Event-Related Cortical Potentials and “Voluntary” Movements

Are the very best better in:

n Strength? What makes a n Stamina? superior athlete? n Eye-hand coordination, reaction time? n Speed? n Agility? n Practiced skills? YES—TO SOME DEGREE, BUT . . .

20 What distinguishes the super Superstars must be very good on elite athletes from the merely all these relevant parameters very good?

n They are always a step ahead of the n But usually they aren’t all that much play better in these categories than the next echelon of highly skilled players n They are in position BEFORE the ball or puck gets there n So, what’s the secret ingredient? n They have (subconsciously) read and extrapolated from the current field set-up and are already reacting before the actual play develops.

21 The brains of batters who IT’S THE are any good at it have already begun the swing before the ball leaves the pitcher’s hand

So what does all this have to do Most people are unaware of how much information processing typically goes on with skepticism? outside of focal awareness.

n They are prone to assume that if they n Know something and can’t remember having learned it or even having been exposed to it n Have a sudden, unexplained emotional experience n Have a strong hunch, premonition, feeling of familiarity, “vision” or reverie, or “novel” idea that, “just popped into my head” from “out of the blue” n Seem to have done something without willing it n This must be evidence for divine inspiration, tapping into some kind of “universal mind”, spiritual possession or guidance, etc.

22 Something Not necessarily n These seemingly spooky things could just be the result of processing in an unattended module of the brain or one that operates autonomously, must be going on . . . without awareness.

We don’t always know what’s going on in there . . .

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