Running head: VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 1

Word Priming and its Effect on the Unconscious

Maria Rodriguez

Florida International University

VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 2

Abstract

Age and valence priming can influence the way people feel. These studies analyzed participant’s

feelings after being primed with elderly, youthful, or neutral words (Study One), and elderly or

youthful words that held a positive or negative connotation (Study Two). In Study One, 212

participants, mostly college students and community members, completed a questionnaire in

which they were given a task to complete sentences with 4 out of 5 words given. The excluded

word held an elderly or youthful connotation depending on the randomly assigned condition.

Right after they had to look at a picture and describe what they perceived it to be. In Study Two,

917 participants, mostly college students and community members, randomly completed one of

the four different versions of the same questionnaire (elderly and positive, elderly and negative,

youthful and positive, youthful and negative) given on study one but with negative or positive

connotations added to the excluded words, and then looked at the same picture. In both studies,

participants primed with elderly (Study One) or elderly and negative words (Study Two) felt

elder and more sluggish than those primed with youthful words. Also, those who were primed

with elderly words reported to see an old woman in the picture more than those in the youthful

condition. These results indicate that word priming can have an impact on feelings and

perception.

Keywords: age priming, valence priming, feelings, stereotypes, perception

VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 3

Word Priming and its Effect on the Unconscious

Words can have negative and positive impacts on human beings. Their effect is rather

subjective, and people react to them different depending on many factors such as mood,

circumstances, and others. However, there is a well-known phenomenon in psychology called

priming which consists of the effect a preceding stimulus has on our behavior (McNamara,

1994). In today’s world priming is everywhere we look at, which makes it hard to be aware of

how much it can affect your behavior, mood, and even thoughts. It ranges from rather obvious

advertising we see everywhere to more subtle situations such as algorithms in social media that

show ads controlled by external sources with an agenda. Aside from the big phenomenon that

priming in media is, there is word priming which can be used in extensive ways in order to cause

certain responses to manipulated stimuli. The extent and power of word priming is so broad that

even experiments have been done on how words can cause pro or anti-social thinking in people

(Leighton, Bird, Orsini & Heyes, 2008).

Word priming consists of exposing an individual to certain words and testing what effect

it had, if any. Its effects have been studied countless of times in many different ways, sometimes

combined with different kinds of stimuli. Casper and Wentura (2011) did an experiment on

priming which consisted on combining pictures and words to stimulate common stereotypes

about older people from participants. The study used pictures of older people combined with

words that portray common stereotypes in order to elicit stereotypical responses from the

participants. Results showed that the experiment led to participants demonstrating an increased

association of stereotypes after being primed with pictures and words, while our study focused

on whether priming can alter feelings, these results demonstrated that priming can indeed

produce the intended response if manipulated accordingly. However, priming can go even further
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 4

than just eliciting stereotypes, it can even interfere in our lives to an extent where it can have an

effect on performance and self-efficacy.

In the widely known experiment conducted by Bargh et al. (1996) there were three

experiments conducted, the second one consisted on priming participants with elderly words, the

researchers then observed that those primed with elderly words walked slower when going down

the stairs in contrast with those neutrally primed who walked at a regular pace, meaning that not

only the priming elicited the association of stereotypes, it went as far as to alter the behavior of

the participants. This research study is about how words can impact the mood of a person

depending on what the stimulus is trying to elicit. The study supports the hypothesis that states

priming with words can be manipulated to alter the mood of the participant. However, the study

has been put into question since replications have shown that walking speed has decreased only

when experimenters expected it, which could mean some bias could have taken place, or there

are other factors affecting the behavior of participants that have not been taken into account

(Doyen et al., 2012).

In this research participants will be asked to form sentences with four scrambled words,

always making the word that doesn’t go with the sentence the priming stimulus, this will ensure

the participant will have to pay attention to the word when making the conscious effort of

excluding it form the sentence they will be forming. There will be three conditions; elderly,

youthful, and neutral priming. The questionnaires will be distributed randomly with one of the

three conditions. After completing the sentences, they will see a photo with an optical illusion, in

which they will either see a woman or an older lady. One example of elderly priming is Kirchner

et al. (2017) who conducted a study in which older employees were given a simple mail sorting

task; they were divided into three groups, one being negatively primed before performing the
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 5

task, another being positively primed, and a control group being neutrally primed. Results

showed that those negatively primed performed significantly worse than those positively primed,

and even worse than the control group. This experiment supports the hypothesis that priming can

affect the mood and even the performance of the participant depending on the tone of the words

they are reading, or the type of stimuli that is been supplemented.

Moreover, there are more studies that have proven more types of effects that elderly

priming can have on people, like a study conducted by Dioux et al. (2016) in which they tried to

once again replicate previous studies on how activating the elderly stereotypes changes the

outcomes of certain tasks. In this study they did two trials, one in which the participants were

primed with one of the three conditions; young, elderly, and neutral, very similar to the essence

of this study, then they did a lexical decision task, participants primed with the younger words

responded faster than those primed with elderly. However, not only were they faster, they were

more reckless with their answers showing that stimuli not only affected their behavior, but it

awoke stereotypes pertinent to younger adults tending to be less wise than older people (Dioux et

al.,2016). In this experiment it will be tested whether priming with scrambled words has an effect

on behavior and other variables that could be affecting the results.

In general, we want to test if elderly priming will lead people to feel older and see an old

woman in the image, while youthful primes will lead people to feel young and see a young

woman in the image. More specifically: We predict that if participants are primed with elderly

words, then they will feel more sluggish, exhausted, and old (and less energized, excited, and

youthful) than participants primed with youthful words, with those in the neutral condition

falling in-between those extremes. We also predict that if primed with elderly words, then

participants will be more likely to see an old woman in the ambiguous picture compared to those
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 6

primed with youthful words, who will be more likely to see a young woman, with those in the

neutral condition showing no preference for either the old or young woman.

Method

Participants

Two-hundred and twelve participants, made up of college students from Florida

International University (91.5%), and (8.5%) of community members. Out of these 212

participants 42.5% (N=90) were male, and 57.5% (N=122) were female. Ages oscillated from 15

years-old to 79 years-old (M = 27.45, SD =11.42). The population consisted of 43.4% Hispanics

(N =92), 30.7% Caucasians (N = 65), 12.7% African Americans (N = 27), 5.7% Asian Americans

(N=12), 1.9% Native Indians (N = 4), and 5.7% Others (N = 12).

Materials and Procedure

The materials utilized were questionnaires each priming for a different condition. There

were three conditions; elderly, youthful, and neutral. The questionnaires were either given as

hard copy with to fill out with pencil or taken electronically in computers. The questionnaires

were divided in five parts; Part One-Language Skills, Part Two-Feelings Inventory, Part Three-

Picture perfection, Part Four-Demographics, and Part Five-Manipulation Check. The first thing

on the questionnaire is the university’s name, Florida International University, and the semester

which was Summer, 2019. Right after the school’s information there was an informed consent

explaining the class to which the experiment belonged to, and the information that was to be

collected.

Part One of the questionnaires was called Language Skills, this part functions as the

independent variable because if the priming does have an effect on feelings then it will influence

the rest of the questionnaire. This part consisted on twelve questions that contained five words
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 7

which the participant was supposed to read and form a sentence with only four out of those five

words, it was rather obvious which four words would make more sense to form a sentence with,

making the “excluded word” the priming word. The four words with the purpose of being part of

the sentence were the same in all the questionnaires, what changed throughout them was the

excluded words which held different connotations depending on the condition the questionnaire

was running. For example; in the neutral priming questionnaire the excluded words were things

such as dog, slightly, etc. The excluded words in the elderly priming questionnaire were words

that hold negative connotations such as helpless, lonely, etc. Finally, the youthful condition used

words such as hopeful, energetic, etc.

Part Two-Feelings Inventory is our first dependent variables, it consists of six statements

the participants rated on a scale from one to seven, one being “not at all”, and seven being

“extremely”. This section had statements such as “I feel energize” and the participants would

pick a number on the scale, picking one meant they did not feel energized at all, and picking

seven meant they felt extremely energized, a rating of four would mean they felt neutral about it.

The rest of the statements stated feeling exhausted, excited, sluggish, old, and youthful. For this

second part an ANOVA test was done on the statement “I feel old”, and “I feel youthful”, this

was done in order to compare how the statistics of those two responses varied depending on the

condition, the rest was not analyzed.

Part Three-Picture Perception is the next section which is a dependent variable that is

expected to be altered depending on the condition the participant is randomly placed in. In this

part there were instructions indicating the participants to examine an ambiguous picture that can

be interpreted as a young woman, or an old woman. After the picture there were two questions,

the first question asked to pick one of the four options. The first question presented the options
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 8

“I see a mountain”, the second option was “I see the an old woman”, the third option was “I see

a young woman”, and lastly “ I don’t see any of the above”. The second question asked if they

had seen anything else other than what they had already stated in question one, it had the same

choices as the first question plus “I still see only what I chose in question one”. In order to

analyze this dependent variable a chi square was used since the data is not scaled.

Part Four-Demographics asks the participant about their gender, race, age, their first

language and if they’re an FIU student. This part offers a disclaimer that says the participant has

the right to leave questions blank if they do not feel comfortable answering them. Question three

asked about their race/ethnicity and it offered Caucasian, Hispanic American, Native Indian,

African American, Asian American, and “other” as options. Also, question four asks the

participant if their first language is English, there is an option under to write their first language

if it is not English, this data was analyzed with descriptive statistics (frequencies) in order to

know the mean, median, mode, standard deviation, maximum, and minimum, of the variables

gender, age, and race. Lastly, part five was used as a manipulation check, it was a multiple

choice question in which the participants were asked to remember part one where they created

the sentences, and pick from four options that read, elderly words, youthful words, neutral

words, and I do not know. This part was also analyzed with a chi square. Once the participants

were done completing the questionnaire, they were given a brief explanation of the phenomenon

of priming and explained the purpose of the experiment.

Results

A Chi-square test was ran on the manipulation check since it was a categorical dependent

variable in order to compare what we expected with what we actually observed, it consisted in a

multiple choice question with four choices to pick from; "elderly words”, “youthful words”,
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 9

“neutral words”, and “I do not know”. There was a significant effect, χ2(6)=14.970 p = .020.

Most participants in the elderly condition responded, “I do not know” (66.2%). However, the

second most picked choice was elderly (19.7%). For the youthful condition, again, most

participants chose “I do not know” (67.6%). Yet the second highest score was youthful (18.3%).

In neutral condition most participants answered, “I do not know” (68.6%), and the second

highest was neutral (14.3%). These results indicate that most participants might not have noticed

the priming since in all conditions the most popular response was “I do not know.

One-way ANOVA was used to test the significance of one of the questions from Part-

Two Feelings Inventory, it was done using the priming condition as the independent variable,

and the ratings of the chosen statement, “I feel sluggish”, as the dependent variable, since it is a

scaled variable ANOVA is the most appropriate test to run. There was a significant effect,

F(2,209) =16.675, p <.001. Since there is clearly a difference, and ANOVA doesn’t really tell

much about the differences among the conditions a Tukey post-hoc was necessary. Tukey post-

hoc showed that participants in the elderly condition felt more sluggish (M=4.37, SD=1.427)

than in the youthful condition (M=3.14, SD=1.41), or neutral condition (M=3.26, SD=1.41). The

youthful and neutral conditions were almost the same, however, the elderly condition differed

significantly. These results support the hypothesis that those exposed to elderly primes will feel

more sluggish than those exposed to the other two conditions.

Another Chi-square test was run on Part-Three Picture Perception, which was a

nominal scale since it had four options to choose from. It was predicted that those primed with

elderly words will be more likely to see an old woman, and those primed with youthful words

would see the young woman. The results were significant χ2(6)=120.49 p<.001. Those in the

elderly condition saw an old woman (90.1%), in contrast to those in the youthful condition that
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 10

mostly saw a young woman (90.1%), while those in the neutral condition saw both almost

equally; young woman (44.3%), and older woman (41.4%). These results support the hypothesis

that those running elderly condition will be more likely to see the picture of an old woman, while

those running the youthful condition were more likely to see a younger woman.

Discussion Study One

It was predicted that participants primed with elderly words would feel more

sluggish, and old, and those primed with youthful words would feel more energized, and young,

with the neutral condition falling in the middle of the other two. Also, those in the elderly

condition would be more likely to see the old lady, and those in the youthful condition would see

the young woman with the neutral condition falling between the extremes. The ANOVA results

indicated that for Part-Two Feeling Inventory, elderly participants felt more sluggish compared

to the other two conditions supporting the hypothesis which stated those primed with elderly

condition would score higher on this feeling. Two Chi-square tests were run, the first one on the

manipulation check whose results indicated the participants were most likely not aware of the

priming. The second Chi-square was run on question one of Part-Three Picture Perception, the

results were significant, those in the elderly condition saw the old woman the most, while those

in the youthful condition saw mostly the old woman, and those in the neutral condition fell

between the extremes. These results support the prediction that those in the elderly condition

would most likely see the old woman, and those in the youthful condition would see a younger

woman. In general the results seemed to be mixed but mainly favoring the hypothesis, it seems

that the priming was not obvious enough for participants to notice it on a conscious level, even

though the results for the manipulation check were significant, most of the participants answered

“I do not know”. This could be because the priming words do not hold strong connotations, how
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 11

would that change if the “excluded words” were negative or positive stereotypes about a certain

age?

Study Two

Words often hold certain connotations that can alter the behavior and/or mood of people.

In the first part of this study it was observed how words could have an effect on people’s feelings

depending on their meaning and connotation. For the second part of the study a new independent

variable with two levels was added. The new independent variable consists on altering the

valence of the age prime within the sentences, making the excluded words positive or negative

depending on what condition was being run; however, they were still either elderly or youthful.

Since the two independent variables had two levels each, a 2x2 design was created, therefore

creating four possible conditions; elderly and positive, elderly and negative, youthful and

positive, youthful and negative. Many research studies have been done on how negative and

positive age stereotypes can affect a person. For example; Meisner (2012) conducted a meta-

analysis of positive and negative stereotypes priming effects on older people specifically, while it

is well-known that priming can affect the behavior of people it is lesser known that the priming

of these stereotypes can even be a predictor of health, and illness of the people affected by it.

Meisner’s research is a review of previous research done on the topic, his results concluded that

overall negative stereotyping impairs the behavior of older adults, while positive stereotyping

enhances it.

Often when doing research on priming the main focus is how it can affect the behavior of

people, sometimes targeting specific age ranges and sex, other times using random participants

with no limitations. Many of the research studies done on priming usually target specific age

groups or compare them. For example; Stein, Blanchard-Fields, and Hertzog (2002) conducted a
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 12

similar research in which they tested how negative and positive stereotypes impacted the

memory of young and old adults. Participants were randomly assigned to either positive,

negative, or neutral condition, very similar to the new independent variable of our study. After

being assigned a condition they tested their memory performance with two tasks; a photo recall

in which participants associated pictures of older and younger adults alongside a sentence that

depicted an activity with a negative, positive, or neutral connotation, and a dot location task in

which participants looked at the placement of dots on a grid for 10 seconds to later try to

replicate the pattern (Stein et al., 2002). Results showed that negative stereotypes undermined

their memory performance; however, positive age stereotypes did not affect their memory (Stein,

et al., 2002). Another research on negative and positive priming directed towards older adults is

Bock and Akpinar’s (2016) which tested how negative and positive age stereotypes can impact

cognitive capacity of older people to make decisions on an errand. They randomly selected

participants in the age range of 60 and 85 and gave them scrambled sentences of 5 words from

which they had to form a 4-word sentence; this is the same method used in study one and two.

After being primed with the sentences they performed a grocery shopping task online in which

they had instructions on what to buy and later were presented with aisles to look at and find those

products (Bock & Akpinar 2016). Results showed that positive age priming improved

participants’ cognitive functions leading to less mistakes while negative age priming had the

opposite effect (Bock & Akpinar 2016).

When it comes to age priming, whether positive or negative, results have been mixed

across all the studies performed. While other researchers have studied positive or negative

stereotypes targeting specific ages, Kotter-Gruhn and Hess (2012) did a study with a different

perspective than the rest. They studied the impact of age stereotype on self-perception of aging
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 13

across the adult lifespan by forming three groups of 61 participants with approximately the same

age distribution who were later assigned to either positive, negative, or neutral priming condition

(Kotter-Gruhn & Hess, 2012). Participants completed surveys measuring their age satisfaction

and subjective age before and after the priming. It is similar to the first study in the aspect that

three different conditions were run, also similar to the second study because it integrates the use

of negative or positive priming. However, the independent variable of this study also includes

the variation of whether the stereotype is about the young or elderly combined with being

negative or positive. Results showed that positive age priming did not improve the self-

perception of aging of participants, in fact it made the middle aged and older adults feel older;

negative priming made the older, and younger adults want to be younger (Kotter-Gruhn & Hess,

2012).

In the broad topic of priming it is typical for them to focus on older adults which are

deemed as more age receptive; therefore, tend to be more affected by negative or positive age

stereotypes. However, some research has focused on only younger participants; in both of these

studies the participants are chosen strictly randomly with no age restrictions. Kamijo and Takeda

(2009) conducted a study which focused on how general physical activity levels influence the

cognitive functions of younger adults after being positively, negatively, or neutrally primed. The

experimenters recruited 40 participants which were allocated into two different categories, active

or sedentary (Kamijo & Takeda, 2009). Participants performed a spatial priming task that was

one of the three conditions; positive, negative, and neutral priming (Kamijo & Takeda, 2009).

Results showed that those in the physically active group showed better cognitive processes when

tested on any of the three conditions compared to the sedentary group (Kamijo & Takeda, 2009).
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 14

There are two main analyses in the current study, the first independent variable for the

current study is age priming with two levels; elderly and youthful. The second independent

variable is valanced wording priming, also with two levels; positive and negative. When it comes

to the first dependent variable, participants' feelings, we predict the participants in the elder

condition will feel more sluggish, exhausted, old, and less energized, excited and youthful than

those in the young condition. We predict that for valenced wording priming condition the

participants in the negative condition will feel more sluggish, exhausted, old, and less energized,

excited, and youthful than those in the positive condition. Also, we predict an interaction effect

between age condition and valenced wording condition. Participants in the elder and negative

condition will feel the most sluggish, exhausted, old, and least energized, excited, and youthful.

Participants in young and positive condition will feel the least sluggish, exhausted, old, and most

energized, excited, and youthful. The other two conditions, elder positive and young negative

will fall between these two extremes. For the second independent variable, picture perception,

we predict that if primed with elderly words, then participants will be more likely to see an old

woman in the ambiguous picture compared to those primed with youthful words, who will be

more likely to see a young woman. We also predict that if primed with negative words, then

participants will be more likely to see an old woman in the ambiguous picture compared to those

primed with positive words, who will be more likely to see a young woman.

Method

Participants

Nine-hundred and seventeen participants, 38.4 % (N = 348) college students from Florida

International University, 61.6 % (N = 68) community members recruited by the students

participating in the study, and 1.5 % (N = 11) did not respond. Out of these 917 participants 34.4
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 15

% (N = 315) were male and 64.3 % (N = 590) were female. Ages ranged from around 17 years to

a maximum of 68 years, the average (mean) age was M = 26.88 years (SD = 9.48). The

race/ethnicity of the sample population was made up of 15.7% Caucasians (N = 144), 61.9%

Hispanics (N = 568), 13.4 % African American (N = 123), 3.1 % Asian American (N = 28), and

4.4% other (N = 40). Also, English was the first language for 62.5% of participants (N = 573).

Materials

For study two a qualtrics questionnaire was created that could be accessed online by

participants through personal electronic devices such as computers, tablets, or phones. The

questionnaires started with a consent section that included the purpose of the study, number of

participants, duration of the study, procedures, risks, benefits, researcher contact information,

and a yes or no question asking for consent to proceed with the study.

Part One: Language Skills section consisted on the participants forming sentences

with 4 words out of 5 given. Part Two: Feelings Inventory consisted on scaling the participants

feelings at the moment of completing the questionnaire. Part Three: Picture perception presented

the participant with an ambiguous picture of a woman that can be perceived as old or young. Part

Four: Demographics asked the participants basic questions about ethnicity, gender, etc. Lastly,

Part Five: Recall asked the participants if they could remember the connotation of the excluded

words. Part two used a rating scale from 1to 7, 1 being strongly disagree to 7 being strongly

agree. Also, a new question was added to Part Five asking whether the excluded word held a

positive or negative connotation.

Procedure
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 16

In order to recruit participants, the researchers were asked to send the qualtrics

questionnaire link through email to 5 people of their choice as long as they were fluent in

English. This sample of the population was mainly made of FIU students and community

members. Participants then accessed the questionnaires through some sort of electronic device

(ex. computer, phone, tablet). The questionnaires start with a consent form that explains the

purpose of the study, the approximate time it should take them to complete it, risks, and benefits.

One thing to note is that the purpose of the study was explained vaguely in order to obtain

truthful and significant answers from the participants. At the bottom of the page there was a yes,

or no question asking for consent, once the participant clicked yes, they continued to the first part

of the study.

Part One of the study consisted on forming 11 sentences with 4 words out of 5 given,

these five words were chosen in a way where it was relatively easy to distinguish the 4 words

that made sense together and form a sentence; for example, for one of the sentences the words

were: picture, he, a, lively, paints. The true purpose of the experiment is to observe how valence

priming affects people’s feelings by manipulating the excluded word. In total there are 4

different versions of the online questionnaires which are assigned randomly to participants;

therefore, the excluded word was manipulated depending on what condition was being run.

There were two independent variables, one dictated whether the word was going to hold an

elderly or youthful connotation just like study one, and the new independent variable was

whether the word would be positive or negative. In total there were 4 possible conditions; elderly

positive, elderly negative, youthful positive, youthful negative.

Exactly like study one, Part-Two: Feelings inventory presented the participants with 6

statements about how they felt in the moment. The statements stated things such as “I feel
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 17

energized”, or “I feel excited”. Instructions indicated the participants to pick a number from a

scale ranging from 1 to 6, 1 being strongly disagree, and 6 being strongly agree. Part-Two served

as one of the dependent variables that were hypothesized to be affected depending on the

condition of the questionnaire. Part Three: Picture Perception was also very similar to study one,

at the top of the page there were instructions stating to look at a picture then choose two

responses from two multiple choice questions. The picture was an ambiguous picture of a

woman that can be perceived as either young or old. The first multiple choice asked the

participant what they had seen the first time they looked at the pictures, and they had four

choices to pick from. The second multiple choice asked the participants if they could see

something else in the picture and offered them 4 choices to choose from. The first multiple

choice question stated “I see the picture of a young woman”, “I see the picture of an old

woman”, and “other”. The second multiple choice included the same choices as the first, and “I

do not see anything else”. Part Three also served as a dependent variable that would vary

depending on the condition of the questionnaire. Part Four: Demographics asked the participant

their age, gender, race/ethnicity, whether English was their first language, and if not, they had the

option to specify, lastly, if they were a FIU student or not.

The last part of the questionnaire consisted on 2 questions that served as a manipulation

check; the first question asked the participant to recall if the word they excluded in the first task

was elderly, or youthful, they also had the choice to choose “unknown”, the second question

asked the participant to recall whether those excluded words were positive, negative, or unknown

At the end of the survey the participant was thanked for their participation and debriefed with a

detailed explanation of the true purpose of the experiment.

VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 18

Results

A Chi-square test was performed for the first independent variable which included two

conditions; elderly, and youthful. It was performed in order to observe whether participants

could recall the connotation of the words they were presented with. There was a significant

effect, c2 (2) = 13.16, p = .001. However, Cramer’s V shows a very weak correlation being only

0.12. Only 21.8% of participants in the elderly condition were able to recall the condition of the

words, and only 24.4% of participants in the youthful condition. This shows that most

participants did not notice the connotation of the words even though the Chi-square was

significant the correlation was weak.

Another Chi-square test was done to observe the effects of the valanced priming, the

second and new independent variable, which consisted in randomly mixing the two levels of the

first independent variable with negative or positive connotations. There was a significant effect,

c2 (2) = 83.90, p < .001. While the Chi-square was significant Cramer’s V showed a medium

correlation of .304. Out of those primed with positive words, 61.9% noticed, making it a strong

correlation; however, out of those primed with negative only 14.4% noticed.

The first 2 x 2 factorial ANOVA was run with the “I feel sluggish” statement as the

dependent variable with elderly, or youthful condition, and negative or positive as the

independent variables. There was a significant main effect of valence priming on the statement “I

feel sluggish”, F (1, 911) =7.589, p < .01. Participants who were in the positive condition (M =

4.07, SD = 1.659) answered approximately like those in the negative condition (M = 4.38, SD =

1.676), there is moderate difference that indicates that those in the negative condition felt

somewhat more sluggish. There was a significant main effect of elderly, or youthful condition on

the statement “I feel sluggish”, F (1, 911) = 8.757, p < .01. Participants who were in the elderly
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 19

condition (M = 4.40, SD = 1.708) performed moderately higher than those in the youthful

condition (M = 4.06, SD = 1.623). The interaction between the two independent variables (age,

and valence priming) was also analyzed on the “I feel sluggish” statement. There was no

significant interaction among valence and age priming, F (1, 911) = 2.710 , p = .100 (Table 2).

However, there is a difference between positive and elder (M = 4.14, SD = 1.641), and negative

and elder (M = 4.63, SD = 1.736), participants were seemingly more receptive to feeling sluggish

when the priming was elderly and negative.

The second 2 x 2 factorial ANOVA was run, with age and valence priming as

independent variables and the statement “I feel old” as the dependent variable. The results

showed a significant main effect of valence priming on the statement “I feel old”, F (1, 911) =

4.578, p < 0.05. Participants in the positive condition (M = 3.30, SD = 1.648) answered

moderately lower than those in the negative condition (M = 3.57, SD = 1.942). There was a

significant main effect of age priming on the statement “I feel old”, F (1, 911) = 18.197, p <

0.01. Participants who were in the elderly condition (M = 3.70, SD = 1.911) felt a slightly older

than those in the youthful condition (M = 3.18, SD = 1.666). The interaction effect between the

two independent variables (age and valence priming) on the statement “I feel old” was analyzed,

too. There was no significant interaction, F (1,911) = 2.771, p > .05.

Discussion Study Two

For study two a new independent variable was added; valence priming. There were two

main analysis performed (2x2 ANOVA), each examined two main effects and an interaction on

two different dependent variables, “I feel old”, and “I feel sluggish”. We predicted that our first

independent variable age priming would make participants feel more sluggish and older on the

older condition, than the youthful one. Results showed the difference between the two was
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 20

significant, meaning the priming had an effect on the feelings of the participants. Our second,

and new independent variable was valence priming, it was predicted that those participants in the

negative condition would feel more sluggish, and old. Results demonstrated that there was a

significant difference between the two, meaning the participants responses were affected by the

conditions.

Furthermore, interactions between the two independent variables were predicted. Those

in the elder and negative condition would feel most sluggish and old, while those in the young

and positive condition would feel more energized and youthful. The 2x2 ANOVAS performed

showed no significant interaction among the two different independent variables. It was, also,

predicted that those primed with old and negative words would be more likely to see an old

woman in the picture, and those in the youthful and positive conditions would see a younger

woman, but this part of the questionnaire was not analyzed.

General Discussion

The study tested how words can alter the feelings and perceptions of participants.

Throughout both studies, as predicted, the results indicated that words can actually have an

impact on feelings. Both hypotheses for the first study were supported, meaning that participants

in the first study who were given the elderly condition felt more sluggish, old, and exhausted

than those who were in the youthful condition. Also, those in the elderly condition reported

seeing an old woman more frequently than those in the youthful. For the second study more than

half of the hypothesis was supported, those in the elderly and negative condition felt more

sluggish, old, and exhausted in contrast to those in the youthful and positive conditions who felt

more energized, and young. In contrast, those in the negative and youthful condition, and those

in the positive and elderly condition fell between the extremes. Furthermore, the prediction that
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 21

there would be an interaction among valence and age priming was not supported. This could be

due to the fact that the excluded word already had an effect when it had only the elderly or

youthful connotation, meaning that adding positive or negative does not contribute a lot more to

the behavior of the participant. However, it could also be that the way the experiment was set up

did not allow the researcher to observe an interaction and more research should be done on the

topic. As for the picture those in the elderly and negative condition reported seeing and older

woman more frequently, as predicted. Also, those in the positive and youthful predictions

reported to seeing a younger woman more frequently. Overall, the findings of both studies

support the hypothesis that words can have an effect on people’s feelings. In the past, other

studies have, also supported this hypothesis such as Meinser (2012) who conducted a study on

how negative age stereotypes affects people’s behavior, he concluded that those primed with

elderly words even walked slower while leaving the site.

Moreover, other studies have shown how priming can affect feelings, behavior, and

cognitive functions on people. Dioux et a., (2016) conducted a study in which he tested age

priming on young adults in order to see if it would influence their speed or cautiousness. Their

results showed that when primed with young stereotypes participants would respond faster to

lexical tasks, and slower when primed with elderly words. Another study by Bargh et al., (1996)

tested whether priming with stereotypes can alter the social behavior of individuals. They primed

their participants randomly with rude, or polite-related stereotypes with sentences. Results

showed that those primed with rude words interrupted the researcher more than those primed

with polite words (Bargh et al., 1996). Also, they primed other participants with elderly and

younger stereotypes, and later observed that those primed with elderly stereotypes walked slower

when leaving just like the results previously reported by Meinser (2012).
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 22

The topic of our present study has been studied many times before as we can see in our

literature reviews, however, there is still doubt and controversy surrounding the topic since other

experiments have not necessarily supported these predictions. Kotter-Grunh and Hess (2012)

conducted a study in which they tested how age stereotypes affect self-perception across the

adult lifespan, they found that positive age stereotypes did not positively influence self-

perception of aging. Because results have been mixed on various times, it is important to keep

expanding and replicating in different ways how priming affects people. With studies like this

one can see there is a substantial amount of evidence that supports that priming can have various

effects on people. However; this does not mean our study was perfect, in fact, it had some

limitations. For example; for our second study the questionnaire was administered online where

we have no control on how much attention participants are paying to what they are doing, they

might have randomly picked some answers which could negatively impact the validity of our

study. To avoid something like this from happening one could administer the questionnaires to

participants in person, however, this would be more time consuming and could significantly

impact the number of participants that could be recruited. Also, most of the participants are from

a Hispanic background, meaning the sample was not culturally varied and there could have been

language barriers.

Observing how priming can affect behavior, feeling, and cognitive functions can really be

useful for the population. Knowing when to use the right words and what effect they have could

be a revolution on schools, work, hospital settings and many more. It could improve how

teachers talk to students and improve their attention and behavior, or it could be very useful for

work environments to maximize employee potential and retention, etc. Word priming has the
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 23

potential to influence the way the world works; therefore, it deserves attention and research

efforts.
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 24

References

Bargh, J. A., Chen, M., & Burrows, L. (1996). Automaticity of social behavior: Direct effects of

trait construct and stereotype activation on action. Journal of Personality and Social

Psychology, 71(2), 230-244.

Bock, O., & Akpinar, S. (2016). Performance of older persons in a simulated shopping task is

influenced by priming with age stereotypes. PLoS ONE, 11(9), 11.

Casper, C., Rothermund, K., & Wentura, D. (2011). The Activation of Specific Facets of Age

Stereotypes Depends on Individuating Information. Social Cognition, 29(4), 393-414.

Dioux, V., Brochard, R., Gabarrot, F., & Zagar, D. (2016). The Young and the Reckless: Does

Priming Age Stereotype in Young Adults Affect Speed or Cautiousness? Social

Cognition, 34(4), 324-342.

Doyen, S., Klein, O., Pichon, C., & Cleeremans, A. (2012). Behavioral Priming: It’s All in the

Mind, but Whose Mind? PLoS ONE, 7(1).

Kamijo, K., & Takeda, Y. (2009). General physical activity levels influence positive and

negative priming effects in young adults. Clinical Neurophysiology, 120(3), 511-519.

Kirchner, C., Bock, O. L., & Völker, I. (2016). The effects of priming with age stereotypes on a

PC-based mail-sorting task. Ergonomics, 60(4), 512-517.

Kotter-Grühn, D., & Hess, T. M. (2012). The impact of age stereotypes on self-perceptions of

aging across the adult lifespan. The Journals of Gerontology: Series B: Psychological

Sciences and Social Sciences, 67(5), 563-571.

McNamara, T. P. (1994). Theories of priming: II. Types of primes. Journal of Experimental

Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 20(3), 507-520.

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Meisner, B. A. (2012). A meta-analysis of positive and negative age stereotype priming effects

on behavior among older adults. The Journals of Gerontology: Series B: Psychological

Sciences and Social Sciences, 67(1), 13-17.

Stein, R., Blanchard-Fields, F., & Hertzog, C. (2002). The effects of age-stereotype priming on

the memory performance of older adults. Experimental Aging Research, 28(2), 169-181.
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 26

Table 1

Chi- Square on Manipulation Check for Age Priming

Levels of Variable Percentage

Elderly 21.8
Youthful 24.4
Unknown 53.7
c2(2) = 13.116, p =.001

Chi-square on Manipulation Check for Valanced Priming

Levels of Variable Percentage

Positive 61.9
Negative 14.4
Unknown 23.7
c2(2) = 83.90, p < .001
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 27

Table 2

2x2 ANOVA on “I feel sluggish”

Source Sum of Square df Mean F p

Square

Corrected model 55.095 3 18.365 6.674 .000

Intercept 16278.282 1 16278.282 5915.587 .000
ValencedIV 20.883 1 20.883 7.589 .006
AgeIV 24.097 1 24.097 8.757 .003
ValencedIV* AgeIV* 7.4558 1 7.458 2.710 .100
Error 2506.854 911 2.752
Total 18964.000 915
VALENCE PRIMING AND ITS EFFECT ON THE UNCONSCIOUS 28

Table 3

2x2 ANOVA on”I feel old”

Source Sum of Square df Mean F p

Square

Corrected model 85.598 3 28.533 8.919 .000

Intercept 10756.587 1 10756.487 3362.526 .000
Ink color 14.644 1 14.644 4.578 .033
Warning 58.212 1 58.212 18.197 .000
Ink color*Warning 8.865 1 8.865 2.771 .096
Error 2914.253 911 3.199
Total 13851.000 915