Institute of Applied Psychology, School of Public Administration, Guangdong University of Finance, 510521 Guangzhou, China; Laboratory for Behavioral and Regional Finance, Guangdong University of Finance, 510521 Guangzhou, China.
School of Education, Guangdong University of Education, 510303 Guangzhou, China.
Int J Psychophysiol. 2018 Jul;129:41-51. doi: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2018.04.012. Epub 2018 Apr 25.
Previous studies have investigated whether uncertainty influences neural responses to emotional events. The findings of such studies, particularly with respect to event-related potentials (ERPs), have been controversial due to several factors, such as the stimuli that serve as cues and the emotional content of the events. However, it is still unknown whether the effects of uncertainty on ERP responses to emotional events are influenced by anticipation patterns (e.g., explicit or implicit anticipation). To address this issue, participants in the present study were presented with anticipatory cues and then emotional (negative and neutral) pictures. The cues either did or did not signify the emotional content of the upcoming picture. In the inter-stimulus intervals between cues and pictures, participants were asked to estimate the expected probability of the occurrence of a specific emotional category of the subsequent picture based on a scale in the explicit anticipation condition, while in the implicit condition, participants were asked to indicate, using a number on a scale, which color was different from the others. The results revealed that in the explicit condition, uncertainty increased late positive potential (LPP) responses, particularly for negative pictures, whereas LPP responses were larger for certain negative pictures than for uncertain negative pictures in the implicit condition. The findings in the present study suggest that the anticipation pattern influences the effects of uncertainty when evaluation of negative events.
先前的研究已经探讨了不确定性是否会影响对情绪事件的神经反应。由于多种因素，如作为线索的刺激以及事件的情绪内容，这些研究的结果，特别是与事件相关电位（ERP）有关的结果，一直存在争议。然而，不确定性对情绪事件 ERP 反应的影响是否受到预期模式（例如，明确或隐含的预期）的影响，目前尚不清楚。为了解决这个问题，本研究的参与者首先看到了预期线索，然后是情绪（消极和中性）图片。线索要么表示即将出现的图片的情绪内容，要么不表示。在线索和图片之间的刺激间间隔期间，参与者被要求根据明确预期条件下的量表估计随后图片中特定情绪类别的预期出现概率，而在隐含条件下，参与者被要求用量表上的数字来指示哪个颜色与其他颜色不同。结果表明，在明确的预期条件下，不确定性增加了晚期正电位（LPP）的反应，特别是对负面图片而言，而在隐含的预期条件下，某些负面图片的 LPP 反应比不确定的负面图片的 LPP 反应更大。本研究的结果表明，当评估负面事件时，预期模式会影响不确定性的影响。
