Abstract: Power is an old phenomenon for human, but is a new research topic for social psychologist. As a part of social hierarchic relationship, power are constituted with reference to symbolic representations of spatial dimensions such as size and height, even if physical size of the ranked groups is not a determinant of the hierarchy. Stroop interference paradigm and Chinese labels of power group were used in this study to identify the Size Effect in the judgment of power related words, and determine whether the Size Effect can be controlled by some intervention strategies. There were three experiments in this study. Experiment 1 manipulated the font size of the power group labels to explore the influence on power judgments. Experiment 2 explored the controllability of Size Effect by informing participants distinctly about the possible influence of front size the group labels are written in . In addition, Experiment 3 studied the same topic as experiment 2 by not only informing participants but also changing the ratio of compatible and incompatible trials. The results of experiment 1 showed a significant main effect of trials’ type, faster responses occurred when the trials were compatible. Power judgments were slower when the font size did not fit the power of the groups. The results of experiment 2 displayed a margin marked interaction between trials’ type and instruction condition. Experiment 3 furthered this result showed that there was a significant interaction between these two variables, the variation on reaction between compatible and incompatible trials was not obvious when giving instructed information to the participants. Moreover, the results of experiment 3 showed a significant interaction between trials’ type and distribution, participants with a biased distribution reacted more quickly when trials were incompatible. The results suggested that there indeed has a Size Effect in the judgment of Chinese labels about power group. When the Chinese labels of power group were presented in pairs, judgments of the power of groups are influenced by the font size the group labels are written in. And this findings also confirmed the hypothesis that instructed the Size Effect can be controlled by instructed information to remind participants about the possible influence of the font size. Moreover, this effect even be reversed in the biased distribution condition. A high likelihood of incompatible trails helped to control and even reverse the default power of associating large with powerful and small with powerless.

Key words: Power, Physical size, Size Effect, Controllability

摘要： 采用Stroop干扰实验范式，证实权力词语判断的大小效应，并探索采用意识性干预和试次偏差分布策略是否会使大小效应得到控制。实验1中试次类型变量主效应极其显著。实验2中试次类型变量与提示条件变量的交互作用边缘显著。实验3中试次类型变量与提示条件变量的交互作用显著；试次类型变量与试次分布变量的交互作用显著。结果表明，权力相关词语的判断中存在大小效应，提示信息使大小效应得到控制，试次偏差分布使大小效应发生反转。

关键词: 权力, 物理大小, 大小效应, 可控性