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Published on: February 4, 2016
Evaluative Conditioning: Past, Present, and Future
Tal Moran1,2, Yahel Nudler3, Yoav Bar-Anan3
1Department of Education and Psychology, The Open University of Israel, Ra'anana, Israel;
Abstract:
Evaluative conditioning (EC) research investigates changes in the evaluation of a stimulus after co-occurrence with an affective stimulus. To explain the motivation behind this research, this review begins with an overview of the history of EC research, followed by a summary of the state of the art with respect to three key questions. First, how should EC procedures be used to influence evaluation? We provide a guide based on evidence concerning the functional properties of EC effects. Second, how does the EC effect occur? We discuss the possible mediating cognitive processes and their automaticity. Third, are EC effects ubiquitous outside the lab? We discuss the evidence for the external validity of EC research. We conclude that the most important open questions pertain to the relevance of EC to everyday life and to the level of control that characterizes the processes that mediate the EC effect after people notice the stimulus co-occurrence.
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