MERE OWNERSHIP - AFFECTIVE SELF-BIAS OR EVALUATIVE CONDITIONING

Experimental evidence is presented supporting Nuttin's (1985, 1987) co nclusion that the name letter effect (i.e. a preference for letters oc curring in the own name above not-own name letters) is an affective co nsequence of mere ownership. We argue that 'evaluative conditioning' ( e.g. Martin & Levey, 1987) was not fully eradicated by Hoorens (1990) as an alternative explanation for the name letter effect. In the prese nt experiment, we tried to separate evaluative conditioning from owner ship induction. An essential requirement for 'mere' ownership postulat ed by Nuttin (1987) is that the preferences for owned versus not-owned objects are measured or obtained in absence of subjects' awareness of their belongingness to self: This criterion was perhaps not fully sat isfied. However, our results are more in agreement with the mere owner ship view than with an account solely based on evaluative conditioning . The mere ownership effect (i.e. a preference for any object belongin g to the self above any similar object belonging to another) is descri bed as disclosing a purely affective self-bias.