Animacy & Action

Below are demonstrations of the various conditions and phenomena reported in the following paper:

van Buren, B., Uddenberg, S., & Scholl, B. J. (2016). The automaticity of perceiving animacy: Goal-directed motion in simple shapes influences visuomotor behavior even when task-irrelevant. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 23, 797-802.  PDF

Abstract

Here we explored how perceiving animacy may automatically influence behavior. We developed a novel “foraging” task in which subjects used their cursor to collect food dots which appeared sequentially at random locations in the display. We found that foraging performance suffered when several geometric shapes (darts) turned to face toward the subject’s cursor. Moreover, the shapes influenced subjects’ behavior even though they were completely task irrelevant, indicating that we can’t help but attend and react to agents after noticing them. This research was conducted in collaboration with fellow grad student Stefan Uddenberg.

Experiment Conditions

Condition 1: Directed at Cursor

On Directed at Cursor trials, the task-irrelevant darts moved randomly, but always pointed toward the subject's cursor. Foraging performance was impaired in this condition, despite the fact that the darts were completely task-irrelevant!

Condition 2: Perpendicular to Cursor

On Perpendicular to Cursor trials, the task-irrelevant darts were instead always oriented orthogonally to the subject's cursor. This produced no impression of animacy, and correspondingly, no impairment of foraging performance. In other words, the impairment in Directed at Cursor trials is not simply due to the correlated rotary motion of the darts (which was perfectly equated here).

Condition 3: Directed at Computer

On Directed at Computer trials, the task-irrelevant darts pointed toward a separate (computer-controlled) disc. Foraging times were again unimpaired -- thus ensuring that the impairment in Directed at Cursor trials reflects a feeling of being personally menaced.

Demos & Data

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