Aim- McGinnies set out to investigate the effect of emoition on perception by tessting whether offensive or taboo words would take longer to percieve and recognise than neutral words
Method- Using a tachistoscope (scientific instrument used by psychologists; presents visual stimuli (aka pictures) for brief exposures.), participants were presented with words which were either unpleasent and offensive or neutral. the words were projected very rapidly at first with gradually increasing display times. the task was to say each word out loud as soon as it was recognised.
Results- it took participnts a lot longer to recognise offensive taboo words like "crotch" than it did for them to recognise neutral inoffensive words like "plate"
Conclusion- Participants took longer to percieve the offensive taboo words because of perceptual defence, the unconcious defence mechanism acting to protect us from consciously experiencing the unpleasent words
NB- there is no way of knowing people realy didnt recognise the offensive taboo words, because they could have recognsed them but not wanted to say them.
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