THE EFFECT OF NUMEROSITY PERCEPTUAL LOAD ON MORAL LEXICAL TASK

Abstract

Moral decision process is influenced by various distractors is an interesting topic today. Massive online information spark this phenomenon. This study aimed to determine the dynamics of the moral decisions process at the semantic representation stage in manipulated cognitive-perceptual conditions in a lab setting. The data were analyzed with Bayesian ANOVA. In experiment 1, three cognitive tasks that induce high perceptual load were tested, including the flanker task (est = -604.32, l-95% CI = -658.96; u-95% CI = -552.38), the perceptual-letter task (est = -399.39, l-95% CI = -447.93; u-95% CI = -352.78), and the dot numerosity task (est = 2349.64, l-95% CI = 2296.59; u-95% CI = 2403.25). The analysis results showed that the dot numerosity task took the most reaction time and the majority of subjects stated that the task requires greater concentration. In Experiment 2, an perceptual load intervention using dot numerosity task was applied through lexical moral-word decision task. Strong evidence results were found in the main effect moral word reaction speed, with negative moral word have longer respons times, folowed with netral word and positive word. Numerosity effect also was found to stimulate accuracy model in high load group. Further discussion is discussed below.

Keywords: Moral Decision, Lexical Decision Task, Perceptual Load, Cognitive Task