Mind the gap: interhemispheric communication about emotional faces.

This study tested the hypothesis that interhemispheric communication about emotional stimuli is influenced by situational factors that alter emotional relevance. Under evaluative or nonevaluative conditions, participants matched angry and happy faces within a single visual field or across opposite visual fields. An overall across-field advantage (AFA) reflected the benefit of sharing information between the hemispheres. The AFA was greater for angry than for happy faces in the evaluation condition but did not differ for angry and happy faces in the no-evaluation condition. Examination of individual differences indicated that high trait evaluation levels of worry were associated with poorer interhemispheric communication of angry faces, supporting a threat-avoidance conception of worry. Thus, both situational factors and individual differences affected interhemispheric communication about emotional faces.