Skip to Main Content

Experimental Psychology (Russia)
2021. Vol. 14, no. 4, 164–181
doi:10.17759/exppsy.2021140409
ISSN: 2072-7593 / 2311-7036 (online)

Theory and Practice of Awareness Measurement in Experimental Cognitive Research

307

A.K. Kulieva, R.V. Tikhonov, I.I. Ivanchei

PDF (RUS)
Online translation in english
GS
Information
in Google Scholar

Abstract

Measurement of consciousness is one of the key methodological problems of cognitive experiments. The choice of method is often made without reference to a specific theory or the explication of the underlying assumptions about the nature of the phenomenon being measured. It is suggested that the lack of theoretical justification of the employed methods leads to unconstructive criticism and disagreement among researchers. We discussed the most common awareness measures in research on learning, memory, perception, and the underlying assumptions about the nature of consciousness and their relationship to theories of consciousness. The degree of theoretical justification of consciousness measures was assessed in a sample of 179 experimental articles. It was shown that in only a quarter of cases, the researchers linked the methods with corresponding assumptions about the nature of consciousness. In the rest of the cases, the choice of method was not theoretically justified.

General Information

Keywords: consciousness, awareness measures, perception, implicit learning, memory, methods

Journal rubric: Cognitive Psychology

Article type: review article

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17759/exppsy.2021140409

Funding. The reported study was funded by Russian Foundation for Basic Research (RFBR), project number 19-113-50319.

Acknowledgements. The authors are grateful to the participants of the remote scientific seminar "Objective measures and metacognitive metrics of insight solutions" (August 8, 2020) as well as Artur Ammalainen for valuable comments and productive discussion.

Received: 13.08.2020

Accepted:

For citation: Kulieva A.K., Tikhonov R.V., Ivanchei I.I. Theory and Practice of Awareness Measurement in Experimental Cognitive Research. Eksperimental'naâ psihologiâ = Experimental Psychology (Russia), 2021. Vol. 14, no. 4, pp. 164–181. DOI: 10.17759/exppsy.2021140409. (In Russ., аbstr. in Engl.)

References

  1. Allakhverdov V. M. Soznanie kak paradoks [Consciousness as a paradox]. Saint Petersburg, Izdatel’stvo DNK, 2000. 528 p. (In Russ.).
  2. Ivanchei I. I. Znanie «kak» bez znaniya «pochemu»: rol’ metakognitivnoi chuvstvitel’nosti v nauchenii iskusstvennoi grammatike [Knowing “how” without knowing “why”: the role of metacognitive sensitivity in artificial grammar learning]. Vestnik SPbGU Ser. 16. [ Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. Seria 16. Psychology. Education], 2014, no. 4, pp. 109—123. (In Russ.).
  3. Ivanchei I. I., Moroshkina N. V. Izmerenie osoznannosti. Staraya problema na novyi lad [Measures of consciousness. Old problem in a new way]. In V.M. Allakhverdov, O.V. Zashcherinskaya, Kognitivnaia psikhologiia soznaniia [Cognitive psychology of consciousness], 2011, pp. 1—15. (In Russ.).
  4. Baars B. J. A cognitive theory of consciousness, Cambridge [England], Cambridge University Press, 1988. 424 p.
  5. Berry D. C., Broadbent D. E. Interactive tasks and the implicit-explicit distinction. British Journal of Psychology. 1988, vol. 79, no. 2, pp. 251—272.
  6. Butler B. C., Klein R. Inattentional blindness for ignored words: Comparison of explicit and implicit memory tasks. Consciousness and Cognition. 2009, vol. 18, no. 3, pp. 811—819.
  7. Charles L., Van Opstal F., Marti S., Dehaene S. Distinct brain mechanisms for conscious versus subliminal error detection. Neuroimage. 2013, vol. 73, pp. 80—94.
  8. Cheesman J., Merikle P. M. Priming with and without awareness. Perception & Psychophysics. 1984, vol. 36, no. 4, pp. 387—395.
  9. Cleeremans A., Achoui D., Beauny A., Keuninckx L., Martin J.-R., Muñoz-Moldes S., Vuillaume L., de Heering A. Learning to Be Conscious. Trends in Cognitive Sciences. 2020, vol. 24, no. 2, pp. 112—123.
  10. Debner J. A., Jacoby L. L. Unconscious perception: Attention, awareness, and control. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition. 1994, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 304.
  11. Desender K., Van Opstal F., Van den Bussche E. Feeling the Conflict: The Crucial Role of Conflict Experience in Adaptation. Psychological Science. 2014, vol. 25, no. 3, pp. 675—683.
  12. Destrebecqz A., Cleeremans A. Can sequence learning be implicit? New evidence with the process dissociation procedure. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review. 2001, vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 343—350.
  13. Dienes Z., Berry D. Implicit learning: Below the subjective threshold. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review. 1997, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 3—23.
  14. Dienes Z., Scott R. Measuring unconscious knowledge: distinguishing structural knowledge and judgment knowledge. Psychological Research Psychologische Forschung. 2005, vol. 69, no. 5—6, pp. 338— 351.
  15. Dixon N. F. Subliminal Perception: The Nature of a Controversy, McGraw-Hill, 1971.
  16. Duncker K. On problem-solving. Psychological Monographs. 1945, vol. 58, no. 5, pp. i—113.
  17. Eckstein D., Kubat M., Perrig W. J. Visible homonyms are ambiguous, subliminal homonyms are not: A close look at priming. Consciousness and Cognition. 2011, vol. 20, no. 4, pp. 1327—1343.
  18. Ellenberger H. F. The discovery of the unconscious: The history and evolution of dynamic psychiatry, Basic Books New York, 1970.
  19. Godfroid A., Schmidtke J. What do eye movements tell us about awareness? A triangulation of eye-movement data, verbal reports and vocabulary learning scores. Noticing and second language acquisition: Studies in honor of Richard Schmidt. 2013, pp. 183—205.
  20. Haider H., Rose M. How to investigate insight: A proposal. Methods. 2007, vol. 42, no. 1, pp. 49—57.
  21. Hartman M., Knopman D. S., Nissen M. J. Implicit learning of new verbal associations. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition. 1989, vol. 15, no. 6, pp. 1070.
  22. Hasegawa K., Takahashi S. The role of visual awareness for conflict adaptation in the masked priming task: comparing block-wise adaptation with trial-by-trial adaptation. Frontiers in psychology. 2014, vol. 5, pp. 1347.
  23. Holender D. Semantic activation without conscious identification in dichotic listening, parafoveal vision, and visual masking: A survey and appraisal. Behavioral and brain Sciences. 1986, vol. 9, no. 1, pp. 1—23.
  24. Hull C. L. Quantitative aspects of evolution of concepts: An experimental study. Psychological Monographs. 1920, vol. 28, no. 1, pp. i—86.
  25. Ivanchei I., Moroshkina N., Tikhonov R., Ovchinnikova I.Implicit learning in attractiveness evaluation: The role of conformity and analytical processing. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. 2019, vol. 148, no. 9, pp. 1505—1516.
  26. Jacoby L. L. A process dissociation framework: Separating automatic from intentional uses of memory. Journal of Memory and Language. 1991, vol. 30, no. 5, pp. 513—541.
  27. Laloyaux C., Devue C., Doyen S., David E., Cleeremans A. Undetected changes in visible stimuli influence subsequent decisions. Consciousness and cognition. 2008, vol. 17, no. 3, pp. 646—656.
  28. Massimini M., Ferrarelli F., Murphy M. J., Huber R., Riedner B. A., Casarotto S., Tononi G. Cortical reactivity and effective connectivity during REM sleep in humans. Cognitive neuroscience. 2010, vol. 1, no. 3, pp. 176—183.
  29. Mathews R. C., Buss R. R., Stanley W. B., Blanchard-Fields F., Cho J. R., Druhan B. Role of implicit and explicit processes in learning from examples: A synergistic effect. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition. 1989, vol. 15, no. 6, pp. 1083—1100.
  30. Mealor A., Dienes Z. No-loss gambling shows the speed of the unconscious. Consciousness and Cognition. 2012, vol. 21, no. 1, pp. 228—237.
  31. Michel M. The Mismeasure of Consciousness: A problem of coordination for the Perceptual Awareness Scale. Philosophy of Science. 2019, vol. 86, no. 5, pp. 1239—1249.
  32. Moroshkina N. V., Ivanchei I. I., Karpov A. D., Ovchinnikova I. The verbalization effect on implicit learning. In Cleeremans A., Allakhverdov V. and Kuvaldina M. (eds.), Implicit learning 50 years on. London and New York, Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2019, pp. 189-207
  33. Most S. B., Scholl B. J., Clifford E. R., Simons D. J. What you see is what you set: sustained inattentional blindness and the capture of awareness. Psychological review. 2005, no. 1 (112), pp. 217.
  34. Naber M., Frässle S., Einhäuser W. Perceptual rivalry: reflexes reveal the gradual nature of visual awareness. PLoS One. 2011, vol. 6, no. 6, pp. e20910.
  35. Newell B. R., Shanks D. R. Unconscious influences on decision making: A critical review. Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 2014, vol. 37, no. 1, pp. 1—19.
  36. Nisbett R. E., Wilson T. D. Telling more than we can know: Verbal reports on mental processes. Psychological Review. 1977, vol. 84, no. 3, pp. 231—259.
  37. Norman E., Price M. C. Measuring consciousness with confidence ratings. Behavioural methods in consciousness research. 2015, pp. 159—180.
  38. Overgaard M. The challenge of measuring consciousness. Behavioural methods in consciousness research. 2015, pp. 7—19.
  39. Persaud N., McLeod P., Cowey A. Post-decision wagering objectively measures awareness. Nature Neuroscience. 2007, vol. 10, no. 2, pp. 257—261.
  40. Ramsøy T. Z., Overgaard M. Introspection and subliminal perception. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences. 2004, vol. 3, no. 1, pp. 1—23.
  41. Reber A. S. Implicit learning of artificial grammars. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior. 1967, vol. 6, no. 6, pp. 855—863.
  42. Rensink R. A., O’Regan J. K., Clark J. J. To See or not to See: The Need for Attention to Perceive Changes in Scenes. Psychological Science. 1997, vol. 8, no. 5, pp. 368—373.
  43. Rosenthal D. M. Consciousness and mind. Oxford and New York, Oxford University Press, 2005.
  44. Sandberg K. et al. Evidence of weak conscious experiences in the exclusion task. Frontiers in psychology, 2014, vol. 5, pp. 1080.
  45. Schooler J. W., Engstler-Schooler T. Y. Verbal overshadowing of visual memories: Some things are better left unsaid. Cognitive psychology. 1990, vol. 22, no. 1, pp. 36—71.
  46. Scott R. B., Dienes Z. The conscious, the unconscious, and familiarity. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition. 2008, vol. 34, no. 5, pp. 1264—1288.
  47. Shanks D. R., St. John M. F. Characteristics of dissociable learning systems. Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 1994, pp. 367—395.
  48. Skóra Z., Del Pin S. H., Derda M., Koculak M., Rutiku R., Wierzchoń No validity without a theory—a critical look at subjective measures of consciousness. Neuroscience of Consciousness. 2021, vol. 7, no. 1, p. niab009.
  49. Stadler M. A. On learning complex procedural knowledge. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition. 1989, vol. 15, no. 6, pp. 1061.
  50. Thorndike E. L., Rock R. T. Learning without awareness of what is being learned or intent to learn it. Journal of Experimental Psychology. 1934, vol. 17, no. 1, pp. 1—19.
  51. Tononi G., Boly M., Massimini M., Koch C. Integrated information theory: from consciousness to its physical substrate. Nature Reviews Neuroscience. 2016, vol. 17, no. 7, pp. 450—461.
  52. Tsuchiya N., Wilke M., Frässle S., Lamme, V. A. No-report paradigms: extracting the true neural correlates of consciousness // Trends in cognitive sciences, 2015. 19. № 12. P. 757-770.
  53. Tulving E. Memory and consciousness. Canadian Psychology/Psychologie canadienne. 1985, vol. 26, no. 1, pp. 1—12.
  54. Yordanova J., Kirov R., Kolev V. Increased Performance Variability as a Marker of Implicit/Explicit Interactions in Knowledge Awareness. Frontiers in Psychology. 2015. Vol. 6. P. 1957.

Information About the Authors

Almara K. Kulieva, PhD in Psychology, Associate Professor at the Department of General Psychology, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), Junior Researcher at the Cognitive Psychology of User Interfaces Research and Education Lab, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russia, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4622-0896, e-mail: almara.kulieva@gmail.com

Roman V. Tikhonov, PhD in Psychology, Junior Researcher, Laboratory for Cognitive Studies, Saint Petersburg State University, Junior Researcher, Laboratory of Sociology in Education and Science, HSE University — Saint Petersburg, St.Petersburg, Russia, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1884-1903, e-mail: roman.tikhonov@me.com

Ivan I. Ivanchei, PhD in Psychology, Researcher of the Laboratory of Cognitive Research, Department of Psychology, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), Researcher of the Department of Experimental Psychology, Ghent University (Ghent, Belgium), Moscow, Russia, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8716-8575, e-mail: i.ivanchei@spbu.ru

Metrics

Views

Total: 926
Previous month: 23
Current month: 30

Downloads

Total: 307
Previous month: 8
Current month: 11