Motor Fluency and Preference Judgments: Typing Speed as a Predictor of Letter Dyad Likeability

The literature on embodied cognition has shown that the perception of action-related stimuli can trigger a covert motor simulation of the action usually associated with these stimuli. Such simulation is thus closely linked to previous experiences with the objects and hence to memory processes. Preliminary evidence shows that sensorimotor fluency originating from the motor system can influence higher cognitive processes, such as preference judgments, when observing action-related stimuli, such as letter dyads (e.g., FA, TR): fluent (i.e., easier to type) dyads on the QWERTY keyboard are preferred over nonfluent dyads. These effects were attributed to the automatic activation of fluent motor programs during the observation of dyads. With the aim of gaining a better understanding of the role of fluency in preference judgments, we further investigated this effect by comparing slow and fast typists who should have different motor programs associated with the dyads and should therefore show different preferences. Our results show that fluency affects likeability of letter dyads, but in different ways for slow and fast typists: slow participants showed a preference for fluent dyads, while fast participants did not. We concluded that fast typists, who are characterized by greater typing skills, considered both types of dyads as subjectively fluent, leading to no specific preferences, while slow typists, who are characterized by lower typing skills, preferred easy dyads.