Efeitos da emoção induzida por estimulação subliminar sobre a aprendizagem implícita

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the effect of negative emotional induction made with subliminal stimulus on implicit learning tasks. Seventeen subjects (10 female) were assigned randomly to two groups, experimental (EG) and control (CG). For both groups, images from International Affective Picture System (IAPS) were presented, each for 17 milliseconds, with negative valence (EG) neutral valence (CG). After this emotional induction, subjects performed two implicit learning tasks: stimulus sequence (T1) and motor sequence (T2). For both tasks, the correct answer rate and reaction time were measured, which were submitted to a mixed variance analysis (ANOVA) with a between factor [2 emotional valences (neutral and negative)] and a within factor (blocks). Results showed that emotional induction was not effective, or at least did not maintain itself during the experiment. Therefore, we could not find differences between EG and CG in both tasks. We conclude that the subjects learned sequences implicitly and we discuss the reasoning behind the inefficiency of the emotional induction.