Verbal classical conditioning of evaluative responses

Jaanus, H; Defares, P.B.; Zwaan, E.J.

doi:10.1016/0146-6402(90)90002-8

Cited by 8 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 86 publications

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“…K. Staats & Staats, 1957). C. K. Staats and Staats (1957), for instance, showed that nonsense words that were paired with either positive or negative words acquired the same affective value of the words with which they were paired (see Jaanus, Defares, & Zwaan, 1990, for a review). Modern EC research was sparked by the work of Levey and Martin (1975).…”

Section: A Short History Of Evaluative Conditioning Research and Debatesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluative conditioning in humans: A meta-analysis.

Hofmann

Houwer

Perugini

et al. 2010

Psychological Bulletin

827

755

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This article presents a meta-analysis of research on evaluative conditioning (EC), defined as a change in the liking of a stimulus (conditioned stimulus; CS) that results from pairing that stimulus with other positive or negative stimuli (unconditioned stimulus; US). Across a total of 214 studies included in the main sample, the mean EC effect was d ϭ .52, with a 95% confidence interval of .466 -.582. As estimated from a random-effects model, about 70% of the variance in effect sizes were attributable to true systematic variation rather than sampling error. Moderator analyses were conducted to partially explain this variation, both as a function of concrete aspects of the procedural implementation and as a function of the abstract aspects of the relation between CS and US. Among a range of other findings, EC effects were stronger for high than for low contingency awareness, for supraliminal than for subliminal US presentation, for postacquisition than for postextinction effects, and for self-report than for implicit measures. These findings are discussed with regard to the procedural boundary conditions of EC and theoretical accounts about the mental processes underlying EC.Keywords: evaluative conditioning, affective learning, attitude learning, associative learning, propositional learning One of the most influential ideas in psychology is that human behavior is, to a large extent, governed by likes and dislikes (Allport, 1935;Martin & Levey, 1978). For instance, people prefer the company of people they like and try to avoid those they do not like; people buy and consume products they like rather than those they dislike; and they vote for and support politicians and ideas that they find sympathetic rather than repelling. Furthermore, preferences influence attention, memory, and judgments and form the basis of our emotional life (Fox, 2009). Given the pervasive impact of preferences on behavior, it is vital for our discipline to understand how preferences are formed and how they can be influenced. Although some likes and dislikes may be genetically determined (Poulton & Menzies, 2002), the vast majority of our preferences are learned rather than innate (Rozin & Millman, 1987). But precisely how humans acquire their likes and dislikes continues to be the subject of vigorous debate (Rozin, 1982;De Houwer, Thomas, & Baeyens, 2001).The present article provides a meta-analysis of research on one possible manner in which likes and dislikes can be learned: evaluative conditioning (EC), which may be best defined as an effect that is attributed to a particular core procedure. Specifically, EC refers to a change in the valence of a stimulus (the effect) that is due to the pairing of that stimulus with another positive or negative stimulus (the procedure) (De Houwer, 2007a;De Houwer et al., 2001). The first stimulus is often referred to as the conditioned stimulus (CS), and the second stimulus is often referred to as the unconditioned stimulus (US). Typically, a CS becomes more positive when it has been paired with a posit...

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Section: A Short History Of Evaluative Conditioning Research and Debatesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluative conditioning in humans: A meta-analysis.

Hofmann

Houwer

Perugini

et al. 2010

Psychological Bulletin

827

755

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Although couched in different theoretical concepts, findings from the verbal conditioning paradigm developed by Staats and Staats (1957) also provide early evidence of EC. Staats and Staats demonstrated that nonsense words paired with either positively or negatively valenced words acquired the same affective value of the words with which they were paired (see Jaanus, Defares, & Zwaan, 1990, for a review).…”

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confidence: 99%

Association learning of likes and dislikes: A review of 25 years of research on human evaluative conditioning.

Houwer¹,

Thomas²,

Baeyens³

2001

Psychological Bulletin

1,021

843

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Evaluative conditioning refers to changes in the liking of a stimulus that are due to the fact that the stimulus has been paired with other, positive or negative stimuli. Although evaluative conditioning appears to be subjected to certain boundary conditions, significant evaluative conditioning effects have been obtained using a large variety of stimuli and procedures. Some data suggest that evaluative conditioning can occur under conditions that do not support other forms of Pavlovian conditioning, and several models have been proposed to account for these differences. In the present article, the authors summarize the available literature, draw conclusions where possible, and provide suggestions for future research.

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“…Many previous studies have reported that the association between linguistic and referential information can be learned through our perceptual and emotional experiences in the first and second languages (Breitenstein et al 2005 ; Carpenter and Olson 2012 ; Cornelissen et al 2004 ; Grönholm et al 2005 ; Havas et al 2018 ; Hawkins et al 2015 ; Hawkins and Rastle 2016 ; Horinouchi et al under revision; Hultén et al 2009 ; Jeong et al 2010 ; Kambara et al 2013 ; Lee et al 2003 ; Li et al 2020 ; Liu et al 2021 ; Takashima et al 2017 ; Tsukiura et al 2010 , 2011 ; Yan et al 2021 ; Yang et al 2021 ). Other studies have found that participants could condition subjective evaluations (unconditioned responses: UCR) of real words and perceptual stimuli (unconditioned stimuli: UCS or US) to those (conditioned responses: CR) of other real words, pseudowords, symbols, and other perceptual stimuli (conditioned stimuli: CS, e.g., Barnes-Holmes et al 2000 ; Cicero and Tryon 1989 ; Hughes et al 2018 ; Paivio 1964 ; Staats and Staats 1958a ; Staats et al 1961 ; Staats and Staats 1957 ; Till and Priluck 2000 , 2001 ; Tryon and Cicero 1989 ; Valdivia-Salas et al 2013 ; for review, De Houwer et al 2001 ; Jaanus et al 1990 ). The phenomenon, in which people condition evaluations of stimuli to those of other stimuli, has been termed evaluative conditioning (Hofman et al 2010 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These dimensions are associated with semantic differential methods (Osgood et al 1957 ) and Self-Assessment Manikin (Bladley and Lang 1984). The verbally evaluative conditioning (learning) can affect the evaluative meanings (evaluative responses) of words (Jaanus et al 1990 ). As pioneers of the verbally evaluative conditioning, Staats and Staats ( 1957 ) showed that native English speakers conditioned subjective evaluations (meanings) of spoken English words to those of English pseudowords in the three dimensions (evaluation, potency, and activity).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Japanese written pseudowords can be conditioned to Japanese spoken words with positive, negative, and active emotions

Ando

Kambara

2023

Cogn Process

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This study aimed to examine whether Japanese participants condition spoken words’ meanings to written pseudowords. In Survey 1, we selected spoken words associated with negative (α = .91) and positive (α = .79) features for Experiment 1 and passive (α = .90) and active (α = .80) features for Experiment 2. In Experiment 1, participants evaluated four written pseudowords’ emotional valence using a 7-point semantic differential scale (1: negative; 7: positive) before and after conditioning spoken words with negative, neutral, or positive features to each pseudoword. In the conditioning phase, participants read each pseudoword, listened to a spoken word, and verbally repeated each spoken word. The results showed that a pseudoword was conditioned to spoken words with positive and negative features. In Experiment 2, participants evaluated four pseudowords’ activeness using a 7-point semantic differential scale (1: passive; 7: active) before and after conditioning spoken words of passive, neutral, and active features to each written pseudoword. In the conditioning phase, the participants read each written pseudoword, listened to a spoken word, and repeated the spoken word. The results showed that the activeness evaluations were more increased for pseudowords conditioned to spoken words of active and neutral features after conditioning than before conditioning but were unchanged for a pseudoword conditioned to those with passive features before and after conditioning. Additonally, Survey 2’s results showed that although the positiveness and activeness responses of the words used in Experiments 1 and 2 were controlled well, the lack of significant differences among positiveness responses of words may influence the evaluative conditioning in Experiment 2. That is, when participants condition passive (low arousal) words’ activeness (arousal) ratings to those of pseudowords, words’ positiveness (valence) ratings would be important in the evaluative conditioning. Our findings suggest that participants can condition spoken word meanings of preference and activeness to those of written pseudowords. It also indicates that linguistically evaluative conditioning’s effects are robust in a non-alphabetic language.

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Verbal classical conditioning of evaluative responses

Cited by 8 publications

References 86 publications

Evaluative conditioning in humans: A meta-analysis.

Evaluative conditioning in humans: A meta-analysis.

Association learning of likes and dislikes: A review of 25 years of research on human evaluative conditioning.

Japanese written pseudowords can be conditioned to Japanese spoken words with positive, negative, and active emotions

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