Research On The Influence Of Keeping Secrets On Perceptual Judgment From The Perspective Of Embodied Cognition

Holding personal secrets is a ubiquitous part of real life.People use the metaphors related to body perception such as “being weighed down” or “being burdened” to express psychological and physical state when they keep secrets.The embodied cognition theory holds that the metaphors existing in our language is fundamentally derived from our body's perceptual experience,conceptual metaphor theory emphasizes bearing actual phisical weight can be used as a metaphorical representation of abstract concepts such as importance and psychological burden,which making secrecy can set up a possible connection with physical experience of actually bearing weight.Many research have found that the physical state affects the individual's perception judgment.In the case of bearing actual phisical weight of the body,the individual would judge a certain distance seems to be more distant,and the hill slant seems to become steeper.Whether keeping personal secrets can produce a similar effect as bearing actual phisical weight of the body,and then affecting the individual perception judgment?Based on previous research,our study examines the impact of keeping secrets on individual perception judgments through three behavioral experiments.All the three experiments used the mood-inducing method,and they all first let the participants recall the secrets with high or low preoccupation,so that the mood of participants was changed,finally participants need to complete perceptual judgment task.Experiment 1 used a single factor between subjects experimental design to explore the effect of secrecy(preoccupying secrets,non-preoccupying secrets,don't recall secrets)on the participants' subjective weight judgment.Experiment 2 used a 3(secrecy:preoccupying secrets,non-preoccupying secrets,don't recall secrets)× 2(judgment type:hill slant,control project)mixed experimental design.The purpose is to explore the effect of secrecy on the participants' hill slant judgment.Experiment 3 used a 3(secrecy: preoccupying secrets,non-preoccupying secrets,don't recall secrets)×2(sport type: weightlifting,pole vault)mixed experimental design,the purpose is to explore the effect of secrecy on the behavior judgment about weight to others.The results showed that:(1)secrecy affected individuals' judgment on their subjective weight and hill slant.Compared with participants who were keeping non-preoccupying secrets and don't recalling secrets,those participants who were keeping preoccupying secrets would judge their subjective weight to be heavier and judge the hill slant seems to become steeper.And the difference had reached to a significant level.(2)secrecy affected individuals' perception and action judgment of other people.Compared with participants who were keeping non-preoccupying secrets and don't recalling secrets,those participants who were keeping preoccupying secrets would judge athletes to be less likely to succeed in weight-related competitions.(3)There is a consistent relationship between secrecy and physical burdens,The experience of keeping secrets affects the individual's perception and behavior just like our body is actually bearing a heavy burden.