Script Author: Katja Borchert, Ph.D. (katjab@millisecond.com), Millisecond
Created: April 25, 2013
Last Modified: July 28, 2026 by K. Borchert (katjab@millisecond.com), Millisecond
Script Copyright © Millisecond Software, LLC
This script implements a Subliminal Priming Procedure.
In general, priming procedures are simple response-timed binary categorization tasks of items from two target categories (e.g. positive vs. negative adjectives). Priming Procedures are based on the assumption that people respond faster if the target category was already 'mentally activated' by briefly presenting items (called 'primes') that are closely connected in one's mind. For example, a person should be faster to quickly categorize the target word 'good' as 'positive' after the brief presentation of the prime word 'ice-cream' than after the brief presentation of the prime word 'famine'. Priming Procedure can thus be used to study implicit attitudes. Faster reaction times to targets after primes from a specific category are interpreted as indicative of an existing relationship/association between the categories in the person's mind.
If the primes are presented with a temporal duration that can be consciously processed, the primes are called 'supraliminal'. If the duration of the primes is so short that they are outside one's conscious awareness the primes are called 'subliminal'. This script uses subliminal primes.
In this script, the primes that are used have been previously be conditioned to be a positive or a negative condition stimulus (CS). Without the conditioning the default primes used in this script have likely no affect on target categorization.
Michael A. Olson, M.A. & Fazio, R.H. (2002). Implicit acquisition and manifestation of classically conditioned attitudes. Social Cognition, 20, 89-103.
3 minutes
After seeing an alphanumeric mask (that is very briefly "interrupted" by a subliminal prime), participants are asked to categorize adjectives as positive or negative. Two primes are used that have been conditioned to be a positive and a negative CS in a prior study (for more info on the conditioning part of the study see Olson & Fazio, 2002).
most of the stimuli used in this script are not the originals;
they can be edited under section Editable Stimuli in script subliminalpriming_stimuli_inc.iqjs
the instructions used in this script are not originals;
they can be edited under section Editable Instructions in script subliminalpriming_instructions_inc.iqjs
File Name: subliminalpriming_summary*.iqdat
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| startDate | Date the session was run |
| startTime | Time the session was run |
| subjectId | Participant ID |
| groupId | Group number |
| sessionId | Session number |
| elapsedTime | Session duration in ms |
| inquisit.version | Inquisit version number |
| computer.platform | Device platform: win | mac |ios | android |
| computer.touch | 0 = device has no touchscreen capabilities; 1 = device has touchscreen capabilities |
| computer.hasKeyboard | 0 = no external keyboard detected; 1 = external keyboard detected |
| display.refreshRate | Refreshrate of the current monitor (e.g. 60Hz => a new stimuli is possible to show every 16.67ms) |
| completed | 0 = Test was not completed 1 = Test was completed |
| propCorrect | Overall proportion correct (test trials only) |
| meanRT | Overall correct mean latency in ms (test trials only) |
See Prime1 & Prime2 For Which Prime Was Assigned Prime1 And Prime2 |
|
| prime1 | Stores the assigned prime1 item |
| prime2 | Stores the assigned prime2 item |
| propCorrectPrime1Pos | Proportion correct in Prime1-Positive Adjective Pairings |
| propCorrectPrime1Neg | Proportion correct in Prime1-Negative Adjective Pairings |
| propCorrectPrime2Pos | Proportion correct in Prime2-Positive Adjective Pairings |
| propCorrectPrime2Neg | Proportion correct in Prime2-Negative Adjective Pairings |
| meanrtPrime1Pos | Correct mean latency (in ms) in Prime1-Positive Adjective Pairings |
| meanrtPrime1Neg | Correct mean latency (in ms) in Prime1-Negative Adjective Pairings |
| diffRTPrime1 | Difference in pos-neg mean response times for targets following prime1 IF prime1 = positive => negative difference supports subliminal priming effect of prime1 (faster categorizing positive targets) IF prime1 = negative => positive difference supports subliminal priming effect of prime1 (slower categorizing positive targets) |
| meanrtPrime2Pos | Correct mean latency (in ms) in Prime2-Positive Adjective Pairings |
| meanrtPrime2Neg | Correct mean latency (in ms) in Prime2-Negative Adjective Pairings |
| diffRTPrime1 | Difference in pos-neg mean response times for targets following prime2 IF prime2 = positive => negative difference supports subliminal priming effect of prime2 (faster categorizing positive targets) IF prime2 = negative => positive difference supports subliminal priming effect of prime2 (slower categorizing positive targets) |
File Name: subliminalpriming_raw*.iqdat
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| date | Date the session was run |
| time | Time the session was run |
| subject | Participant ID |
| group | Group number |
| session | Session number |
| build | Inquisit version number |
| computer.platform | Device platform: win | mac |ios | android |
| computer.touch | 0 = device has no touchscreen capabilities; 1 = device has touchscreen capabilities |
| computer.hasKeyboard | 0 = no external keyboard detected; 1 = external keyboard detected |
| display.refreshRate | Refreshrate of the current monitor (e.g. 60Hz => a new stimuli is possible to show every 16.67ms) |
| blockcode | The name the current block (built-in Inquisit variable) |
| blocknum | The number of the current block (built-in Inquisit variable) |
| trialcode | The name of the currently recorded trial (built-in Inquisit variable) |
| trialnum | The number of the currently recorded trial (built-in Inquisit variable) trialnum is a built-in Inquisit variable; it counts all trials run even those that do not store data to the data file. |
| prime1 | Stores the assigned prime1 item |
| prime2 | Stores the assigned prime2 item |
| selectPrime1 | Store the assignment (itemnumber) of primes to prime1 and prime2 selectPrime2 |
| targetIndex | Stores the targetIndex of the current target adjective |
| response | The participant's response (scancode of response button) 30 = A 38 = L 57 = spacebar 0 = no response |
| correct | The correctness of the response (1 = correct; 0 = incorrect) |
| latency | The response latency (in ms); measured from onset of target word |
The procedure can be adjusted by setting the following parameters.
| Name | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|
Sizing Parameters |
||
| fontHeight | Sets the height of the font for all text stimuli | 5% |
Response Keys |
||
| responseKeyLeft | The left responsekey; left on QWERTY keyboard | "A" |
| responseKeyRight | The right responsekey; right on QWERTY keyboard | "L" |