Open AccessAutomaticity in processing spatial-numerical associations: Evidence from a perceptual orientation judgment task of Arabic digits in frames
Author(s) -
Shuyuan Yu,
Baichen Li,
Meng Zhang,
Tianwei Gong,
Xiaomei Li,
Zhaojun Li,
Xuefei Gao,
Shudong Zhang,
Ting Jiang,
Chuansheng Chen
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
plos one
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.99
H-Index - 332
ISSN - 1932-6203
DOI - 10.1371/journal.pone.0229130
Subject(s) - arabic numerals , automaticity , numerical digit , perception , cognitive psychology , parity (physics) , task (project management) , numeral system , orientation (vector space) , psychology , cognition , communication , computer science , speech recognition , arithmetic , mathematics , artificial intelligence , neuroscience , geometry , physics , management , particle physics , economics
Human adults are faster to respond to small/large numerals with their left/right hand when they judge the parity of numerals, which is known as the SNARC (spatial-numerical association of response codes) effect. It has been proposed that the size of the SNARC effect depends on response latencies. The current study introduced a perceptual orientation task, where participants were asked to judge the orientation of a digit or a frame surrounding the digit. The present study first confirmed the SNARC effect with native Chinese speakers (Experiment 1) using a parity task, and then examined whether the emergence and size of the SNARC effect depended on the response latencies (Experiments 2, 3, and 4) using a perceptual orientation judgment task. Our results suggested that (a) the automatic processing of response-related numerical-spatial information occurred with Chinese-speaking participants in the parity task; (b) the SNARC effect was also found when the task did not require semantic access; and (c) the size of the effect depended on the processing speed of the task-relevant dimension. Finally, we proposed an underlying mechanism to explain the SNARC effect in the perceptual orientation judgment task.