engleski

Avatars and vases: The automatic processing of what other people see

Building on the findings of previous research, we modified a dot perspective task in order to conduct a simple visual perceptive experiment. Our participants had to rapidly judge their own perspective or that of a 3D avatar when these perspectives showed the same (consistent) or different number of stimuli (inconsistent). Participants had to judge, as fast as possible, how many stimuli (vases) in the scene were seen by them, or by the avatar. Other studies have shown the information of another person's perspective was processed automatically, prolonging response times for inconsistent trials even when participants made judgements from their own perspective. Recent research has been focused on the contribution of social versus perceptual information for the size of this interference. Our goal was to examine whether perspective taking was under the influence of a salient characteristic: race. Participants (N=35, all female) had to make judgements from a self/other perspective in consistent and inconsistent trials for two identical female 3D models which differed only in the RGB values of skin color. A repeated measure 2(consistency)x2(perspective)x2(race) ANOVA showed a significant effect of consistency (F(1, 34)=32.49, p<.01) with faster responses for consistent (571 ms) compared to inconsistent trials (612 ms). The consistency by perspective interaction was also significant (F(1, 34) = 5.45, p<.05) with post hoc analysis showing a significant consistency effect for the other but not for the self perspective. This interaction was expected but interference was hypothesized to be significant in the self condition even though to a lesser degree. The race effect was also significant F(1, 34)=4.88, p<.05 with slightly faster responses for one's own race avatars (582 ms to 601 ms). No other major effects or interactions approached any significance. The methodological differences among recent studies, as well as the implications for further research, will be discussed.

perspective taking, mentalizing, visual attention

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