Moderating effect of stimulus presentation type, contingency awareness and anxiety on evaluative conditioning: an attentional perspective

The present study explored how evaluative conditioning (EC) is impacted by the type of stimulus presentation (sequential versus simultaneous), considering also other possible attention- and memory-related moderators at both procedural (contingency awareness, ambivalence) and individual levels (anxiety). A sample of 537 adult participants completed either a simultaneous or sequential conditioning procedure using positive, negative, neutral, and ambivalent unconditioned stimuli (US) paired with neutral conditioned stimuli (CS). Participants evaluated the CS both before and after conditioning and completed a memory task assessing their contingency awareness (memory of the US valence paired with each CS). Results indicated that the EC effect was significantly larger in simultaneous conditioning and in the presence of contingency awareness. Participant’s anxiety level did not moderate the effect in either monovalent EC (positive versus negative) or ambivalent EC (ambivalent versus neutral). Findings are discussed in terms of theoretical and practical implications.