Figure 2
Beliefs are associated with vividness of imagination, affective assessment, learning and memory. (a) Plotted are the mean correlation coefficients obtained by correlating for each participant across trials their prior belief (first estimate) with each rating. Results show that participants believed they were more likely to encounter an aversive event when they imagined the event more vividly, less negatively, and also when they were more familiar with the event, and had experienced it in the past. Participants also tended to remember the likelihood presented to them as greater when their prior regarding that likelihood was greater. (b) Average update scores (calculated as the difference between the first and second estimate coded positively when update is towards the information and negatively otherwise) were significantly greater than zero, suggesting that beliefs are modulated in response to new information. (c) Learning scores (the correlation between update and estimation errors) are significantly greater from 0, indicating that subjects were learning. Horizontal lines indicate median values, boxes indicate 25–75% interquartile range, the crosses indicate mean values and whiskers indicate 1.5 × interquartile range; individual scores are shown separately as circles.***p < 0.001. In black are variables of interest for heritability quantification.
