Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

We report the results from two experiments (n=192) examining the congruency effect (better performance for congruent vs incongruent stimuli) for prototype-defined checkerboard composites. We used a complete matching task design as that used to study a robust index of face recognition i.e., the composite face effect. The results from both experiments reveal an effect of order of presentation for congruent and incongruent trials. Critically, participants presented with incongruent first and then congruent trials revealed a significant congruency effect. In contrast, participants presented with congruent first and then incongruent trials showed no congruency effect. These results contribute to the composite effect literature by reporting the first evidence of a congruency effect for artificial non-face stimuli which do not have a predefined orientation. Also, they provide evidence in support of test order as a determining factor potentially modulating the composite effect.