BGB324 Tasks You Are Able To Carry Out All By Yourself

�� Breaks between blocks were self-paced. Prime Awareness Check To determine participants�� objective awareness of the sub-optimally presented facial expressions (i.e., the primes), a forced-choice prime awareness task was administered after the priming task (Van den Bussche et al., 2009). In this task a fixation cross appeared on the screen (400 ms) and replaced by four consecutive masks (13.3 ms each). Then a facial expression was presented for 27 ms and replaced by a blank screen (13.3 ms) which was followed by a series of four masks (13.3 ms each). After the last mask three Dutch words appeared on the screen (Font 28 Arial, in Black, First letter capitalized, 5 cm below the fixation cross and interspaced by 5 cm). These words were ��painful�� (��pijnlijk��), ��happy�� (��blij��), and ��neutral�� (��neutraal��). Participants were explicitly informed that a sub-optimal facial expression was presented on each trial and they were asked to classify that by mouse-clicking the corresponding word. Words were presented until a response was given and after each trial the position of the cursor was returned to the center of the screen. Participants were instructed to guess if they could not see the facial expression. The three facial expression types were presented in a randomized manner (each expression was presented four times, so the task had total of 48 trials). If participants were unaware of the primes, this was indicated by performance at chance level (i.e., 33%) on this prime awareness task. Apparatus Electrocutaneous stimulus delivery, task presentations, and logging of button presses were controlled by a Dell Optiplex 755 computer (OS: windows XP; 2 GB RAM; Intel Core2 Duo processor at 2.33 GHz; ATI Radeon 2400 graphics card with 256 MB of video RAM), running Affect 4.0 software (Spruyt et al., 2010) and connected to a 19�� CRT DELL monitor (75 Hz vertical refresh rate; refresh duration: 13.3 ms/frame), an AZERTY keyboard, a mouse, and a constant current stimulator (see above). Procedure All participants were tested individually in a dimly lit testing room. They were video-monitored and could communicate via an intercom with the this website experimenter who was located in a separate room. Upon arrival at the testing room, they received an information sheet describing the experimental procedure. More specifically, it was explained that the study focused on the factors involved in the perception of pain. Participants were informed that they would perform a simple categorization task while receiving painful electrocutaneous stimuli. Then they signed the informed consent and completed demographic questions and a battery of Dutch questionnaires including the PCS and the FPQ.