so in one early experiment by john barge, for exale, people were flashed words that they didn't see consciously and then they were given a description of a guy named donald. donald was described as in his apartment and a salesman came to the door and he abruptly sent the salesman away. in another segment he goes to a hardware store and buys a gadget andmmediately demands his money back. well, what do we make of donald? is he hostile or is he just assertive? well, it depended on the words that people saw in the first part of the experiment. some of the participants saw words... again, saw in quotation marks because they didn't see these words consciously about words that had to do with hostility. hoste, unfriendly, unkind. whereas those in a control condition saw neutral words like table and chair. and indeed ones who saw the flashes of the words connoting unkindness thought that dond wasn't a very nice guy. they thought, man, he's kind of hostile. whereas those in the control condition whsaw the neutral words kind of gave him the benefit of the doubt and said, well, i guess donald's just kind o