Citation

Nieuwenhuis S, de Kleijn R. Atten. Percept. Psychophys. 2011; 73(2): 364-373.

Affiliation

Institute of Psychology, Cognitive Psychology Unit, Leiden University, Wassenaarseweg 52, 2333, AK Leiden, The Netherlands, snieuwenhuis@fsw.leidenuniv.nl.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2011, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.3758/s13414-010-0026-1

PMID

21264738

PMCID

PMC3037489

Abstract

Models of consciousness differ in whether they predict a gradual change or a discontinuous transition between nonconscious and conscious perception. Sergent and Dehaene (Psychological Science, 15, 720-728, 2004) asked subjects to rate on a continuous scale the subjective visibility of target words presented during an attentional blink. They found that these words were either detected as well as targets outside the attentional-blink period or not detected at all, and interpreted these results as support for a discontinuous transition between nonconscious and conscious processing. We present results from 4 attentional-blink experiments showing that this all-or-none rating pattern disappears with the use of an alternative measure of consciousness (post-decision wagering) and a more difficult identification task. Instead, under these circumstances, subjects used the consciousness rating scales in a continuous fashion. These results are more consistent with models that assume a gradual change between nonconscious and conscious perception during the attentional blink.

Language: en