Perceived objects automatically potentiate afforded action. Object affordances also facilitate perception of such objects, and this occurrence is known as the affordance effect. This study examined whether object affordances facilitate the initial visual processing stage, or perceptual entry processes, using the temporal order judgment task. The onset of the graspable (right-handled) coffee cup was perceived earlier than that of the less graspable (left-handled) cup for right-handed participants. The affordance effect was eliminated when the coffee cups were inverted, which presumably conveyed less affordance information. These results suggest that objects preattentively potentiate the perceptual entry processes in response to their affordances.

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Numbers JP20609565 (to Atsunori Ariga), JP15H05709, JP25242060, and JP16H01866 (to Yuki Yamada).