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Published on: January 24, 2020
Reflections on Eriksen's seminal essay on discrimination, performance and learning without awareness
1Department of Psychology/Vanderbilt Vision Research Center, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, 37240, USA. Randolph.blake@vanderbilt.edu.
Abstract:
Early in his career C.W. Eriksen published in Psychological Review what turned out to be a highly impactful critique on methods and findings on the topic of unconscious influences on discrimination and awareness. His incisive commentary on extant methodology employed at that time - especially the heavy dependence on subjective reports - clearly was heard by others moving forward, as evidenced by the subsequent, lively discussions within the literature concerning the very definition of the notion of unconscious processing. Of equal importance, Eriksen's paper provided an impetus for the development of more refined techniques for manipulating perceptual awareness and for measuring the consequences of those manipulations. My purpose in this essay is to ensure that Eriksen's seminal contributions concerning unconscious phenomena remain within the awareness of the many current investigators working on this popular topic.
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