Inverse cue priming is not limited to masks with relevant features

Apart from positive priming effects, masked prime stimuli can impair responses to a subsequent target stimulus which shares response-critical features in contrast to a target assigned to the opposite response. This counterintuitive phenomenon is called inverse priming (or negative compatibility effect). Here we examine the generality of this phenomenon beyond priming of motor responses. We used a non-motor cue-priming paradigm to study the underlying mechanism of inverse priming for relevant features masks which include task-relevant stimulus features and for irrelevant masks which omit task-relevant features. We found inverse cue-priming effects with both types of masks. With task-irrelevant masks inverse cue-priming was emphasized in those participants being unable to perceive the prime. The existence of inverse non-motor priming under conditions where simple perceptual interactions between the stimuli are ruled out as the source of inverse priming is at odds with the view that inverse priming reflects motor inhibition. Alternatives are discussed.

► Participants performed one of two competing tasks dependent on a prior cue stimulus which was preceded by a masked prime.
► Three experiments were performed using either masks which contain task-relevant elements or no task-relevant elements.
► Evidence for better performance on incongruent trials was found in each experiment irrespective of the mask structure.
► The inverse cue priming effects are independent from cues’ motor effects and conflict with motor theories of inverse priming.
► Inverse priming effects seem to arise from a central mechanism or from multiple similar mechanisms in various systems.