Constraining theories of embodied cognition

Abstract

Influences of perceptual and motor activity on evaluation have led to theories of embodied cognition suggesting that putatively complex judgments can be carried out using only perceptual and motor representations. We present an experiment that revisited a movement-compatibility effect in which people are faster to respond to positive words by pulling a lever than by pushing a lever and are faster to respond to negative words by pushing than by pulling. We demonstrate that the compatibility effect depends on people's representation of their selves in space rather than on their physical location. These data suggest that accounting for embodied phenomena requires understanding the complex interplay between perceptual and motor representations and people's representations of their selves in space.