Predicting Context-Dependent Cross-Modal Associations with Dimension-Specific Polarity Attributions Part 1 – Brightness and Aggression

Abstract

Although researchers have repeatedly shown that the meaning of the same concept can vary across different contexts, it has proven difficult to predict when people will assign which meaning to a concept, and which associations will be activated by a concept. Building on the affective theory of meaning (Osgood, Suci, & Tannenbaum, 1957) and the polarity correspondence principle (Proctor & Cho, 2006), we propose the dimension-specificity hypothesis with the aim to understand and predict the contextdependency of cross-modal associations. We present three sets of experiments in which we use the dimension-specificity hypothesis to predict the cross-modal associations that should emerge between aggression-related concepts and saturation and brightness. The dimension-specificity hypothesis predicts that cross-modal associations emerge depending upon which affective dimension of meaning (i.e., the evaluation, activity, or potency dimension) is most salient in a specific context. The salience of dimensions of meaning is assumed to depend upon the relative conceptual distances between bipolar opposed concept pairs (e.g., good vs. bad). The dimension-specificity hypothesis proposes that plus and minus polarities will be attributed to the bipolar concepts, and associations between concrete and affective abstract concepts that share plus or minus polarities will become activated. Our data support the emergence of dimensionspecific polarity attributions. We discuss the potential of dimension-specific polarity attributions to understand and predict how the context influences the emergence of cross-modal associations.Keywords: cross-modal associations; context-effects; affective dimensions of meaning; color; brightness "It is clear that everything on this planet is relative and has independent existence only insofar as it is distinguished in its relations to and from other things… since every conception is thus the twin of its opposite, how could it be thought of first, how could it be communicated to others who tried to think of it, except by being measured against its opposite?" Abel (as cited in Freud, Collected Papers, Strachey edn, IV, p. 187) Understanding how we give meaning to concepts lies at the core of being able to predict how people behave, think and feel. Studies in cognitive psychology, social cognition, and linguistics convincingly show that taskspecific contexts play a crucial role when constructing meaning and when engaging in conceptual thought (e.g.,

Looking on the Bright Side: Replicating the Association between Brightness and Positivity

“…Both our study (Specker et al, 2018) and the study by Schietecat et al (2018) addressed this issue. A benefit of our design was the more pure focus on finding the boundary conditions of the effect as well as having better controlled stimuli in comparison to Hemphill (1996) and Schietecat et al (2018). In the case of Hemphill (1996) participants saw colored cardboard rectangles of 10 different hues.…”

“…These notions are also in line with accounts such as Lakens et al (2013) who proposed that people have a "brightness bias" where the overall brightness of a stimulus gives it an implicit marker of positivity. More recently, building on this idea of brightness as an implicit marker of positivity, Schietecat, Lakens, IJsselsteijn, and De Kort (2018) proposed a dimension-specificity hypothesis. This hypothesis builds on the work of Osgood, Suci, and Tannenbaum (1957) whose research focused on the meaning that people assign to concepts, in our case assigning the meaning of "positivity" to bright stimuli.…”

“…Our previous findings (Specker et al, 2018) would be in line with the dimension-specificity account. In the studies by Schietecat et al (2018) the assumption is made that brightness is automatically associated with positivity and that thus by manipulating brightness of the stimulus one can make the evaluation dimension salient. Both our and their results seem to support this idea and indicate that brightness is in fact automatically associated with positivity.…”

“…Unfortunately, information on how these cardboard rectangles were produced or under which conditions they were viewed was not reported. In the study by Schietecat et al (2018) viewing conditions were not held constant. Since participants completed the experiment at home, the monitor settings were not controlled and color presentation may have varied widely as a result.…”

Tutorial: Theoretical Considerations When Planning Research on Human Factors in Lighting

“…But light also guides and directs attention and awareness (Steidle and Werth 2014;Veitch 2001) and has meaning even to the point where it induces cognitive associations (e.g., Elliot and Maier 2014;Schietecat et al 2018aSchietecat et al , 2018b. For instance, quite strong associations exist between brightness and goodness (morality) but also activity and liveliness, in contrast to how darkness is generally associated with immorality and, to a lesser extent, inactivity (Schietecat et al 2018a).…”