Michaela Porubanova | SUNY Farmingdale (original) (raw)

Papers by Michaela Porubanova

PLoS ONE, 2014

Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsisten... more Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsistent concepts, enjoy privileged status in terms of memorability. In our study, memory for concepts that violate cultural (cultural schema-level) expectations (e.g., ''illiterate teacher'', ''wooden bottle'', or ''thorny grass'') versus domain-level (ontological) expectations (e.g., ''speaking cat'', ''jumping maple'', or ''melting teacher'') was examined. Concepts that violate cultural expectations, or counter-schematic, were remembered to a greater extent compared with concepts that violate ontological expectations and with intuitive concepts (e.g., ''galloping pony'', ''drying orchid'', or ''convertible car''), in both immediate recall, and delayed recognition tests. Importantly, concepts related to agents showed a memory advantage over concepts not pertaining to agents, but this was true only for expectation-violating concepts. Our results imply that intuitive, everyday concepts are equally attractive and memorable regardless of the presence or absence of agents. However, concepts that violate our expectations (cultural-schema or domain-level) are more memorable when pertaining to agents (humans and animals) than to non-agents (plants or objects/artifacts). We conclude that due to their evolutionary salience, cultural ideas which combine expectancy violations and the involvement of an agent are especially memorable and thus have an enhanced probability of being successfully propagated.

Timing & Time Perception

For a given physical duration, certain events can be experienced as subjectively longer than othe... more For a given physical duration, certain events can be experienced as subjectively longer than others, an illusion referred to as subjective time dilation. Many factors have been shown to lead to this illusion in perceived duration, including low-level visual properties of the stimulus (e.g., increase in motion, brightness, and flicker), an unexpected stimulus in a sequence of events, as well as affective factors. Here we report the results of two experiments in which we tested for the influence of scene and object knowledge on subjective time dilation. Based on the results of earlier studies, we predicted that visual scenes and objects containing semantic violations would be judged as lasting longer than control stimuli. The findings from both experiments indicate that stimuli containing semantic violations were judged to be present for longer than stimuli without semantic violations. We interpret our results to mean that neural processes that encode for perception of duration can op...

Journal of Cognition and Culture

Minimal counterintuitiveness and its automatic processing has been suggested as the explanation o... more Minimal counterintuitiveness and its automatic processing has been suggested as the explanation of persistence and transmission of cultural ideas. This purported automatic processing remains relatively unexplored. We manipulated encoding strategy to assess the persistence of memory for different types of expectation violation. Participants viewed concepts including two types of expectation violation (schema-level or domain-level) or no violation under three different encoding conditions: in the shallow condition participants focused on the perceptual attributes of the concepts, a deep condition probed their semantic meaning, and intentional remembering condition. Participants’ recall was tested immediately as well as 2 weeks later. Our findings showed the greatest memory enhancement for schema-level violations regardless of the encoding condition, while the memory for domain-level violations improved over time. These results suggest two distinct memory patterns for different types o...

Psychological research, Jan 17, 2016

Accurate distinction between self and other representations is fundamental to a range of social c... more Accurate distinction between self and other representations is fundamental to a range of social cognitive capacities, and understanding individual differences in this ability is an important aim for psychological research. This demands accurate measures of self-other distinction (SOD). The present study examined an experimental paradigm employed frequently to measure SOD in the action domain; specifically, we evaluated the rotated finger-action stimuli used increasingly to measure automatic imitation (AI). To assess the suitability of these stimuli, we compared AI elicited by different action stimuli to the performance on a perspective-taking task believed to measure SOD in the perception domain. In two separate experiments we reveal three important findings: firstly, we demonstrate a strong confounding influence of orthogonal-compatibility effects on AI elicited by certain rotated stimuli. Second, we demonstrate the potential for this confounding influence to mask important relatio...

Studia psychologica

Change blindness is an extreme difficulty in detecting changes in visual field that is induced on... more Change blindness is an extreme difficulty in detecting changes in visual field that is induced once a brief blank is interjected in between two alternating images. In the process of searching for a change, visual saliency certainly plays an important role in attracting attention (i.e. popout effect). In our study, we were interested in whether there are high-level scene factors that might attract attention as well. As hypothesized, changes that were probable, central, relevant and within figure were detected more easily than changes improbable, marginal, irrelevant and occurring within background. Interestingly, the change detection of changes occurring within close proximity to figure was most difficult. This indicates that when searching for changes in scenes, parts of the scenes close to the most powerful attractors are being shadowed, and therefore seem to be ignored by selective attention. This could be ascribed to the role of expectations in change detection task. Therefore, we believe that specifically in explicit change detection task an inidivudal might use certain heuristic that helps her scan the scene. The data are discussed in the context of the debate about the nature of scene representations.

Studia Psychologica

Research has shown that the presentation of emotional information interferes with the processing ... more Research has shown that the presentation of emotional information interferes with the processing of neutral information. The present study examined whether one can suppress this interference when being asked to ignore an emotional scene before attention is engaged with a target or if emotional information always engages attention, resulting in attentional capture. We examined participants' ability to actively inhibit emotional scenes of different valence and arousal when identifying neutral scenes. In three experiments, a 4-scene array was presented for 250 ms while one emotional scene was present in the display. The scene was either to be ignored or freely available in the array. The results show that the interference from emotional scenes is a pervasive phenomenon, suggesting an involuntary attentional capture by emotional scenes. Moreover, despite the vast literature on the evolutionary advantage of preferential processing of negative information, we show a potent attentional bias toward positive information.

Timing and Time Perception, 2020

Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology, 2014

In this article, we examine the effects of authority on systemic trust in four different countrie... more In this article, we examine the effects of authority on systemic trust in four different countries (the Czech Republic, Denmark, Mauritius, and the USA). We used a modified Trust Game to assess whether information about salient authority either in a religious or in a secular domain has the effect of enhancing trust in situations where social information is limited. We found that patterns of behavior differ by country, with the USA and the Czech Republic behaving similarly with relatively high trust for secular authorities, medium trust for religious authorities, and low trust for nonauthorities, and that Denmark and Mauritius behave similarly, with medium trust for secular authorities, high trust for religious authorities and low trust for non-authorities. We discuss possible explanations involving how people use social information to make decisions in situations of uncertainty.

In this paper, we critically review MCI theory and the evidence supporting it. MCI theory typical... more In this paper, we critically review MCI theory and the evidence supporting it. MCI theory typically posits that religious concepts violate what we call deep inferences, intuitions stemming from our evolved cognitive architecture rather than shallow inferences that are specific and flexible informational units also used for inference making. We point to serious problems facing the approach, and propose a few corrective measures, avenues for further research, and an alternative view.

Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsisten... more Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsistent concepts, enjoy privileged status in terms of memorability. In our study, memory for concepts that violate cultural (cultural schema-level) expectations (e.g., ‘‘illiterate teacher’’, ‘‘wooden bottle’’, or ‘‘thorny grass’’) versus domain-level (ontological) expectations (e.g., ‘‘speaking cat’’, ‘‘jumping maple’’, or ‘‘melting teacher’’) was examined. Concepts that violate cultural expectations, or counter-schematic, were remembered to a greater extent compared with concepts that violate ontological expectations and with intuitive concepts (e.g., ‘‘galloping pony’’, ‘‘drying orchid’’, or ‘‘convertible car’’), in both immediate recall, and delayed recognition tests. Importantly, concepts related to agents showed a memory advantage over concepts not pertaining to agents, but this was true only for expectation-violating concepts. Our results imply that intuitive, everyday concepts are equally attractive and memorable regardless of the presence or absence of agents. However, concepts that violate our expectations (cultural-schema or domain-level) are more memorable when pertaining to agents (humans and animals) than to non-agents (plants or objects/artifacts). We conclude that due to their evolutionary salience, cultural ideas which combine expectancy violations and the involvement of an agent are especially memorable and thus have an enhanced probability of being successfully propagated.

Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsisten... more Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsistent concepts, enjoy privileged status in terms of memorability. In our study, memory for concepts that violate cultural expectations (cultural schema-level) expectations (e.g., “illiterate teacher”, “wooden bottle”, or “thorny grass”) versus domain-level (ontological) expectations (e.g., “speaking cat”, “jumping maple”, or “melting teacher”) was examined. Concepts that violate cultural expectations, or counter-schematic, were remembered to a greater extent compared with concepts that violate ontological expectations and with intuitive concepts (e.g., “galloping pony”, “drying orchid”, or “convertible car”), in both immediate recall, and delayed recognition tests. Importantly, concepts related to agents showed a memory advantage over concepts not pertaining to agents, but this was true only for expectation-violating concepts. Our results imply that intuitive, everyday concepts are equally attractive and memorable regardless of the presence or absence of agents. However, concepts that violate our expectations (cultural-schema or domain-level) are more memorable when pertaining to agents (humans and animals) than to non-agents (plants or objects/artifacts). We conclude that due to their evolutionary salience, cultural ideas which combine expectancy violations and the involvement of an agent are especially memorable and thus have an enhanced probability of being successfully propagated.

Many religious ideas have attributes that violate our expectations about the state of the natural... more Many religious ideas have attributes that violate our expectations about the state of the natural world. It has been argued that minimal counter-intuitiveness (MCI), defined as a mild violation of innate (ontological) expectations, makes such ideas memorable and prone to cultural transmission. Empirical studies have examined memory for concepts that violate innate ontological expectations; however ideas that defy cultural or learned expectations have been (with few exceptions) overlooked. In our study, we compared memory for ideas that violate intuitive ontologies, learned expectations, and everyday, intuitive ideas. We discuss the mnemonic advantage of minimally counterintuitive ideas in terms of a combination of associative strength and bizarreness.

Several studies have shown that visual recovery after blindness that occurs early in life is neve... more Several studies have shown that visual recovery after blindness that occurs early in life is never complete. The current study investigated whether an extremely long period of blindness might also cause a permanent impairment of visual performance, even in a case of adult-onset blindness. We examined KP, a 71-year-old man who underwent a successful sight-restoring operation after 53 years of blindness. A set of psychophysical tests designed to assess KP's face perception, object recognition, and visual space perception abilities were conducted six months and eight months after the surgery. The results demonstrate that regardless of a lengthy period of normal vision and rich preaccident perceptual experience, KP did not fully integrate this experience, and his visual performance remained greatly compromised. This was particularly evident when the tasks targeted finer levels of perceptual processing. In addition to the decreased robustness of his memory representations, which was hypothesized as the main factor determining visual impairment, other factors that may have affected KP's performance were considered, including compromised visual functions, problems with perceptual organization, deficits in the simultaneous processing of visual information, and reduced cognitive abilities.

The study examined personality predictors (based on Cloninger's psychobiological model of tempera... more The study examined personality predictors (based on Cloninger's psychobiological model of temperament and character -TCI) of life satisfaction in a sample of 15-year-old Czech adolescents (N = 173) and subsequently 3 years after. The focus of the study was to determine the personality dimensions that predict life satisfaction and how those change over 3 years of adolescence. Of all dimensions, significant differences between the two age groups were found only in the character dimensions Self-Directedness and Self-Transcendence. Using stepwise regression analysis, the character scale Self-Directedness alone accounted for 15% of the variance in life satisfaction among 15-year-old adolescents, whereas in the 18-year-old group, 30% of the variance in life satisfaction was explained by the character dimension Self-Directedness and the temperament dimensions Harm Avoidance and Reward Dependence. In both age groups, only Self-Directedness seems to make a unique contribution towards explaining life satisfaction. The results demonstrate that character changes might also account for a great amount of variance in life satisfaction.

Comprehensive Psychiatry

The Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI;) is a self-questionnaire developed to assess the 7 ... more The Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI;) is a self-questionnaire developed to assess the 7 dimensions of personality described by with a total of 29 subscales. In 1999, a revised version was proposed by Cloninger (TCI-R). In this study, we present psychometric properties of the TCI-R from 958 French-speaking participants of Belgium. Women exhibited higher scores for harm avoidance, reward dependence, and cooperativeness dimensions. The proposed factorial structure of 4 temperament dimensions and 3 character dimensions was confirmed. The TCI-R inventory had good test-retest reliabilities as well as good alpha coefficients. The addition of 3 new subscales to the original scale for Persistence has produced a very reliable dimension in the TCI-R.

Articles by Michaela Porubanova

Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsisten... more Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsistent concepts, enjoy privileged status in terms of memorability. In our study, memory for concepts that violate cultural (cultural schema-level) expectations (e.g., ‘‘illiterate teacher’’, ‘‘wooden bottle’’, or ‘‘thorny grass’’) versus domain-level (ontological) expectations (e.g., ‘‘speaking cat’’, ‘‘jumping maple’’, or ‘‘melting teacher’’) was examined. Concepts that violate cultural expectations, or counter-schematic, were remembered to a greater extent compared with concepts that violate ontological expectations and with intuitive concepts (e.g., ‘‘galloping pony’’, ‘‘drying orchid’’, or ‘‘convertible car’’), in both immediate recall, and delayed recognition tests. Importantly, concepts related to agents showed a memory advantage over concepts not pertaining to agents, but this was true only for expectation-violating concepts. Our results imply that intuitive, everyday concepts are equally attractive and memorable regardless of the presence or absence of agents. However, concepts that violate our expectations (cultural-schema or domain-level) are more memorable when pertaining to agents (humans and animals) than to non-agents (plants or objects/artifacts). We conclude that due to their evolutionary salience, cultural ideas which combine expectancy violations and the involvement of an agent are especially memorable and thus have an enhanced probability of being successfully propagated.

PLoS ONE, 2014

Timing & Time Perception

Journal of Cognition and Culture

Psychological research, Jan 17, 2016

Studia psychologica

Studia Psychologica

Timing and Time Perception, 2020

Adaptive Human Behavior and Physiology, 2014

Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsisten... more Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsistent concepts, enjoy privileged status in terms of memorability. In our study, memory for concepts that violate cultural (cultural schema-level) expectations (e.g., ‘‘illiterate teacher’’, ‘‘wooden bottle’’, or ‘‘thorny grass’’) versus domain-level (ontological) expectations (e.g., ‘‘speaking cat’’, ‘‘jumping maple’’, or ‘‘melting teacher’’) was examined. Concepts that violate cultural expectations, or counter-schematic, were remembered to a greater extent compared with concepts that violate ontological expectations and with intuitive concepts (e.g., ‘‘galloping pony’’, ‘‘drying orchid’’, or ‘‘convertible car’’), in both immediate recall, and delayed recognition tests. Importantly, concepts related to agents showed a memory advantage over concepts not pertaining to agents, but this was true only for expectation-violating concepts. Our results imply that intuitive, everyday concepts are equally attractive and memorable regardless of the presence or absence of agents. However, concepts that violate our expectations (cultural-schema or domain-level) are more memorable when pertaining to agents (humans and animals) than to non-agents (plants or objects/artifacts). We conclude that due to their evolutionary salience, cultural ideas which combine expectancy violations and the involvement of an agent are especially memorable and thus have an enhanced probability of being successfully propagated.

Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsisten... more Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsistent concepts, enjoy privileged status in terms of memorability. In our study, memory for concepts that violate cultural expectations (cultural schema-level) expectations (e.g., “illiterate teacher”, “wooden bottle”, or “thorny grass”) versus domain-level (ontological) expectations (e.g., “speaking cat”, “jumping maple”, or “melting teacher”) was examined. Concepts that violate cultural expectations, or counter-schematic, were remembered to a greater extent compared with concepts that violate ontological expectations and with intuitive concepts (e.g., “galloping pony”, “drying orchid”, or “convertible car”), in both immediate recall, and delayed recognition tests. Importantly, concepts related to agents showed a memory advantage over concepts not pertaining to agents, but this was true only for expectation-violating concepts. Our results imply that intuitive, everyday concepts are equally attractive and memorable regardless of the presence or absence of agents. However, concepts that violate our expectations (cultural-schema or domain-level) are more memorable when pertaining to agents (humans and animals) than to non-agents (plants or objects/artifacts). We conclude that due to their evolutionary salience, cultural ideas which combine expectancy violations and the involvement of an agent are especially memorable and thus have an enhanced probability of being successfully propagated.

Comprehensive Psychiatry

Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsisten... more Previous research has shown that ideas which violate our expectations, such as schema-inconsistent concepts, enjoy privileged status in terms of memorability. In our study, memory for concepts that violate cultural (cultural schema-level) expectations (e.g., ‘‘illiterate teacher’’, ‘‘wooden bottle’’, or ‘‘thorny grass’’) versus domain-level (ontological) expectations (e.g., ‘‘speaking cat’’, ‘‘jumping maple’’, or ‘‘melting teacher’’) was examined. Concepts that violate cultural expectations, or counter-schematic, were remembered to a greater extent compared with concepts that violate ontological expectations and with intuitive concepts (e.g., ‘‘galloping pony’’, ‘‘drying orchid’’, or ‘‘convertible car’’), in both immediate recall, and delayed recognition tests. Importantly, concepts related to agents showed a memory advantage over concepts not pertaining to agents, but this was true only for expectation-violating concepts. Our results imply that intuitive, everyday concepts are equally attractive and memorable regardless of the presence or absence of agents. However, concepts that violate our expectations (cultural-schema or domain-level) are more memorable when pertaining to agents (humans and animals) than to non-agents (plants or objects/artifacts). We conclude that due to their evolutionary salience, cultural ideas which combine expectancy violations and the involvement of an agent are especially memorable and thus have an enhanced probability of being successfully propagated.

Many religious ideas have attributes that violate our expectations about the state of the natural... more Many religious ideas have attributes that violate our expectations about the state of the natural world. It has been argued that minimal counter-intuitiveness (MCI), defined as a mild violation of innate (ontological) expectations, makes such ideas memorable and prone to cultural transmission. Empirical studies have examined memory for concepts that violate innate ontological expectations; however the memorability of ideas that defy cultural or learned expectations has been (with few exceptions) overlooked. In our study, we compared memory for ideas that violate intuitive ontologies, learned expectations, and everyday, intuitive ideas. We discuss the mnemonic advantage of minimally counterintuitive ideas in terms of a combination of associative strength and bizarreness.