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A study was conducted to determine if the implicit (unconscious) motivation to control prejudice (IMCP) inhibits spontaneous, unintentional discriminatory behavior. The extent to which an implicit negative attitude toward prejudice (NAP) and an implicit belief that oneself is prejudiced (BOP) influenced IMCP was analyzed.

Four experiments are reported, investigating the mechanisms underlying the compatibility effect in the Implicit Association Test (IAT; Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998). All experiments involved two IATs: flower IAT, in which the target categories were flowers and insects, and number IAT, involving even and odd numbers as target categories. In Experiment 1, using the standard IAT procedure, the two IATs produced equal IAT effects, despite large differences in rated valence contrast between flowers and insects and between even and odd numbers. Experiment 2 used a procedure developed by Klauer and Mierke (2005) and produced results consistent with the view that valence plays a role in the flower IAT but not in the number IAT. Experiments 3 and 4 used manipulations similar to those developed by Rothermund and Wentura (2004) and showed that these manipulations affected the flower IAT and number IAT differently. The results provide converging evidence that the two types of IAT effects--one based on valence and one based on familiarity--are empirically dissociable.

The representations and mechanisms guiding everyday routine sequential action remain incompletely understood. In recent work, the authors proposed a computational model of routine sequential behavior that took the form of a recurrent neural network (M. Botvinick & D. C. Plaut, 2004). Subsequently, R. P. Cooper and T. Shallice (2006) put forth a detailed critique of that work, contrasting it with their own account, which assumes a strict hierarchical processing system (R. P. Cooper & T. Shallice, 2000). The authors respond here to the main points of R. P. Cooper and T. Shallice's (2006) critique. Although careful and constructive, the arguments offered by R. P. Cooper and T. Shallice (2006) mistook several superficial implementational issues for fundamental theoretical ones, underestimated the computational power of recurrent networks as a class, and in some ways mischaracterized the relationship between the accounts they compare. In responding to these points, the authors articulate several key theoretical choices facing models of routine sequential behavior. Keywords: sequential action, computational modeling, procedural memory

An experiment is conducted to investigate the relation between implicit and explicit measures of person impressions. It is suggested that implicit measures reflect simple associations stored in a 'slow-learning' memory system while explicit measure reflect a combination of these associations stored in 'fist-binding' memory system.

Researchers have argued that an implicit procedural-learning system underlies performance for information integration category structures, whereas a separate explicit system underlies performance for rule-based categories. One source of evidence is a dissociation in which procedural interference harms performance in information integration structures, but not in rule-based ones. The present research provides evidence that some form of overall difficulty or category complexity lies at the root of the dissociation. The authors report studies in which procedural interference is observed for even simple rule-based structures under more sensitive testing conditions. Furthermore, the magnitude of the interference is large when the nature of the rule is made more complex. By contrast, the magnitude of interference is greatly reduced for an information integration structure that is cognitively simple. These results challenge the view that a procedural-learning system mediates performance on information integration categories, but not on rule-based ones.

This article reports three experiments in which the representational nature of human object location memory was studied. The results show that multiple frames of reference can be used to encode the spatial relationships among objects. Depending on their dominancy, availability, and validity, these multiple representations interact to determine memory performance. Specifically, representations that are automatically encoded and extensively practiced are more dominant, and their availability improves performance when they are valid. On the other hand, when the dominant representations are available but invalid, people may have to resort to the less dominant representations. As a result, the availability of these dominant but invalid representations can actually hurt performance, due to interference. If these interfering representations are eliminated, the performance is again improved. The implications of these findings for general human spatial cognition are discussed.

Byline: Alan W. Stacy (1), Michael D. Newcomb (2), Susan L. Ames (3) Keywords: HIV; condom use; implicit cognition; memory; drug use Abstract: Implicit cognition theory differs from most other approaches to health behavior in that it emphasizes neurobiologically plausible and experimentally documented memory association processes rather than rational decisions, considerations of pros and cons, or beliefs. The present study of adults from a community population investigated the predictive effects of implicit cognition, as well as behavioral and personality variables (sensation seeking, hostility, conscientiousness, and polydrug use), on risky sexual behaviors (lack of condom use, sex after drug use, and multiple sexual partners). In addition, this study simultaneously investigated the predictors in both a high-risk and a low-risk sample. Results showed that the implicit cognition indicator was a significant, independent predictor of lack of condom use in the high-risk sample. Polydrug use and sensation seeking also had important predictive effects. The results encourage more research on implicit cognition in health behavior and further document links among drug use, personality, and HIV risk behavior. Author Affiliation: (1) Institute for Prevention Research, Department of Preventive Medicine, University of Southern California School of Medicine, CHP 207, 1540 Alcazar Street, Los Angeles, California, 90033 (2) Division of Counseling Psychology, University of Southern California, USA (3) Institute for Prevention Research, Department of Preventive Medicine, University of Southern California, USA Article History: Registration Date: 06/10/2004

Byline: Michel Tuan Pham (1), Marc Vanhuele (2) Keywords: incidental learning; implicit memory; integrated marketing communication; event sponsorship Abstract: Marketers are making increasing use of very brief messages that mention just a brand name or a brand name with a short headline, as in event sponsorship and program endorsements. There has been debate over the effectiveness of these 'advertising fragments.' This paper introduces an approach for controlled testing of the effects of advertising fragments. Using a reaction-time based procedure, we show that a key effect of advertising fragments is to revive established brand associations, even though these associations are not explicitly communicated. This reactivation occurs not only when these names receive focal attention, but also when they receive nonfocal attention. Author Affiliation: (1) Columbia University, Graduate School of Business, 515 Uris Hall, New York, NY, 10027, Phone (2) Groupe HEC, 78351 Joyu-en-Josas Cedex, France, Phone: Article History: Registration Date: 29/09/2004

Studies are conducted using fictitious social groups to examine the efficacy of the Implicit Association Test (IAT) in determining attitudes of people. The findings indicate that the IAT effect depends on the instruction and false implicit attitudes can be represented through the IAT.

The latest claim that verb based implicit causality information is used during sentence-final clausal integration only is examined in two experiments of self-paced reading and eye tracking. Results suggest that implicit causality is used proactively, allowing readers to focus on, and perhaps even predict, what would be talked about next.

Experiments were conducted to examine whether studying a single Deese/Roediger-McDermott (DRM) list produces semantic priming for non studied critical items (CIs) and semantic + repetition priming for studied associates. The results indicate that a long-term semantic priming effect, at least from multiple primes, is replicable across a number of different procedural variations and labs and does not depend on exactly the same processing task being performed on the primes and target.