Intensifying the Dominant Response: Participant-Observer Differences and Nonconscious Effects

Two studies examined the effects of initial nonconscious affective responses on subsequent evaluations made by conversational participants and observers. Participants either first engaged in a subliminal priming task to induce a positive or negative affective response toward a confederate or were in a control (no priming) condition. After the priming task, participants either engaged in an interaction with the confederate or watched the interaction on videotape and then evaluated the confederate. The confederate used an uninvolved interaction style in Study 1 (N = 240) and a more involved style in Study 2 (N = 180). Results for conversational participants suggest that the nonconscious negative prime made the involved interaction seem more positive and the uninvolved interaction seem more negative. As predicted, results were stronger for participants than for observers and were stronger for negative rather than positive nonconscious affect.