Haase, S.J., & Fisk, G.D. (2001). Confidence in word detection predicts word identification: Implications for an unconscious perception paradigm. American Journal of Psychology, 114, 439-468.
The present experiments extend the scope of the Independent Observation Model based on Signal Detection Theory (Macmillan & Creelman, 1991) to complex (word) stimulus sets. In the first experiment, the model predicts the relationship between uncertain detection and subsequent correct identification, thereby providing an alternative interpretation to a phenomenon often described as unconscious perception. Our second experiment employed an exclusion task (Jacoby, Toth, & Yonelinas, 1993), which, according to theories of unconscious perception, should show qualitative differences in performance based on stimulus detection accuracy and may provide a relatively pure measure of conscious vs. unconscious influences (Merikle, Joordens, & Stoltz, 1995). Exclusion performance was also explained by the model, suggesting that undetected words did not unconsciously influence identification responses.