Category-selective attention interacts with partial awareness processes in a continuous manner: An fMRI study

Abstract

Recently, our team found that category-selective attention could modulate tool processing at the partial awareness level and unconscious face processing in the middle occipital gyrus (MOG). However, the modulation effects in MOG were in opposite directions across the masked tool and masked face conditions in that study: MOG activation decreased in the masked faces condition but increased in the masked tools condition under the consistent compared with the inconsistent cue-selective-attentional modulation. In the present study, in order to confirm that the opposite effects were due to the changed contours of the tools, using the same tool pictures and fMRI technique, we devised another two conditions: variant mirror tool picture condition and invariant tool picture condition. The results showed that, during the variant mirror tool picture condition, activation in the MOG decreased under tool-selective attention compared with face-selective attention. Interestingly, however, during the invariant tool picture condition, activation in the MOG revealed neither positive nor negative changes. Combined with the result of increased MOG activity in the changed different tool condition, the three different effects demonstrated not only that the unconscious component of partial awareness processing (no knowledge of the identity of the tool) could be modulated by the category-selective attention in the earlier visual cortex but also that the modulation effect could further interact with the conscious component of partial awareness processing (consciousness of the changing contour of the tool) in a continuous manner.

Keywords:

• top-down
• category-selective attention
• unconscious processes
• partial awareness
• continuous manner
• fMRI

Public Interest Statement

We found several results of interest. First, our perceptual system can process stimuli without our awareness. Second, our conscious expectation can influence the unconscious perception and processing of a stimulus. Thus, the division between consciousness and unconsciousness is not clear. Third, consciousness is not a dichotomous experience, but a graded one. People can be partially conscious of a stimulus. In other words, we can be aware of the existence or some features of a stimulus (conscious component), but not of the identity (unconscious component) of the stimulus. Lastly and most importantly, the conscious and unconscious processing could interact in a complex way. In our study, top-down influences on unconscious component processing of partially conscious stimuli can interact with the conscious component processing of the partially conscious stimuli in a continuous manner.

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Cover image

Source: Advances in Psychology.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 31170983], [grant number 31400870]; the Basic Research Funds of China West Normal University [grant number 13E010].

Notes on contributors

Shen Tu

Shen Tu is a lecturer of Psychology at China West Normal University. He earned PhD in Developmental and Educational Psychology from Southwest University in China. The main present focus of his research and his associates is on the relationship between conscious and unconscious processes, which has two possible aspects: interactions within conscious/unconscious processes, and between conscious and unconscious processes. Specifically, Shen Tu and the coauthors focus on the conscious modulations on unconscious processes and whether and how different unconscious processes interact with each other. The present paper is part of a serial of studies about the conscious modulations on unconscious processes.