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The Role of Conscious Attention in How Weight Serves as an Embodiment of Importance

Inconsistency among findings in the embodied cognition literature suggests a need for theoretical boundary conditions. The current research proposes that conscious attention of a bodily state can moderate its influence on social judgment. Three studies tested this possibility in the case of the demonstrated effect of weight sensations on judgments of an abstract idea's importance. Studies 1 and 2 showed that participants rated a topic as more important when holding a moderately heavy, compared with light, clipboard. However, when the clipboard was very heavy, participants rated the survey topic as less important compared with when the clipboard was moderately heavy. The differences in importance ratings were not caused by derogation of the topic or the activation of a different metaphor. In Study 3, the importance rating difference between light and moderately heavy clipboards was eliminated by explicitly drawing perceiver's attention to the clipboard's weight. Implications and future directions are discussed.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:arizona.edu/oai:arizona.openrepository.com:10150/626122
Date23 August 2017
CreatorsZestcott, Colin A., Stone, Jeff, Landau, Mark J.
ContributorsUniv Arizona, University of Arizona, Tucson, USA, University of Arizona, Tucson, USA, University of Kansas, Lawrence, USA
PublisherSAGE PUBLICATIONS INC
Source SetsUniversity of Arizona
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeArticle
Rights© 2017 by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc
Relationhttp://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0146167217727505

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