The role of mindsets, productions, and perceptual symbols in goal-directed information processing

Three recent conceptualizations have been proposed to account for the manner in which goal-directed activity in one situation can influence judgments, behavioral decisions, and overt behavior in a later situation. One, which accounts for the effect of behavioral mindsets (Wyer & Xu, 2010, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 20, 107), conceptualizes the effect of performing goal-directed behavior in a situation on the strategies selected for use in attaining quite different goals in a later, unrelated situation. A second, stimulated by Anderson's (1983, The architecture of cognition, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA) conceptualization of cognitive productions, accounts for the effects of stimuli of which one is not completely aware on motor behavior that is performed with little if any cognitive mediation. The third, suggested by Barsalou's (1999, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 22, 577; 2008, Annual Review of Psychology, 59, 617) conceptualization of perceptual symbol systems (Barsalou, 1999), accounts for the associations of not only semantic concepts and their metaphorical meanings but also visual images, affective reactions, sensory stimulation (taste, smell, etc.), and behavioral dispositions. Recent research exemplifying effects of each of these formulations is reviewed, and an approach for conceptually integrating their implications into a more general formulation of information processing is suggested.