Visibility Is Not Equivalent to Confidence in a Low Contrast Orientation Discrimination Task

Overview

Journal Front Psychol

Date 2016 Jun 1

PMID 27242566

Citations 19

Authors

Manuel Rausch

Michael Zehetleitner

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

In several visual tasks, participants report that they feel confident about discrimination responses at a level of stimulation at which they would report not seeing the stimulus. How general and reliable is this effect? We compared subjective reports of discrimination confidence and subjective reports of visibility in an orientation discrimination task with varying stimulus contrast. Participants applied more liberal criteria for subjective reports of discrimination confidence than for visibility. While reports of discrimination confidence were more efficient in predicting trial accuracy than reports of visibility, only reports of visibility but not confidence were associated with stimulus contrast in incorrect trials. It is argued that the distinction between discrimination confidence and visibility can be reconciled with both the partial awareness hypothesis and higher order thought theory. We suggest that consciousness research would benefit from differentiating between subjective reports of visibility and confidence.

Citing Articles

The Relation Between Subjective and Objective Measures of Visual Awareness: Current Evidence, Attempt of a Synthesis and Future Research Directions.

Kiefer M, Kammer T J Cogn. 2024; 7(1):59.

PMID: 39035071 PMC: 11259121. DOI: 10.5334/joc.381.

Subjective and objective measures of visual awareness converge.

Kiefer M, Fruhauf V, Kammer T PLoS One. 2023; 18(10):e0292438.

PMID: 37788260 PMC: 10547206. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0292438.

Metacognitive bias resulting from trade-off between local and global motion signals.

Lee A, Yabuki H, Lee I, Or C J Vis. 2023; 23(10):7.

PMID: 37695612 PMC: 10501489. DOI: 10.1167/jov.23.10.7.

Expectations about precision bias metacognition and awareness.

Olawole-Scott H, Yon D J Exp Psychol Gen. 2023; 152(8):2177-2189.

PMID: 36972098 PMC: 10399087. DOI: 10.1037/xge0001371.

Dissociating the Neural Correlates of Subjective Visibility from Those of Decision Confidence.

Mazor M, Dijkstra N, Fleming S J Neurosci. 2022; 42(12):2562-2569.

PMID: 35121637 PMC: 8944226. DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1220-21.2022.

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