Institute of Applied Psychology, Guangdong University of Finance, 510521 Guangzhou, China.
Institute of Applied Psychology, Guangdong University of Finance, 510521 Guangzhou, China.
Physiol Behav. 2019 Jul 1;206:134-142. doi: 10.1016/j.physbeh.2019.04.005. Epub 2019 Apr 4.
Previous event-related potential (ERP) studies using the Go/Nogo task have indicated that response inhibition is influenced by the arousal elicited by emotional stimuli, when those stimuli are relevant to response selection of Go and Nogo trials. Due to stimulus and task design issues, however, it is uncertain whether response inhibition is affected by emotional valence or arousal, when emotional stimuli are irrelevant to response selection. Therefore, the present study aimed to re-investigate this issue by circumventing limitations of previous research. To address this issue, thirty-one young adults (16 females and 15 males) were required to make motor responses to frequently-presented faces of one sex (Go trials) and to inhibit responses to less-frequently presented faces of the opposite sex (Nogo trials). Crucially, the faces were superimposed onto positive, negative and neutral pictures. The pictures were presented in a randomized order. The arousal values between positive and negative pictures were highly matched. Results showed that Nogo faces elicited smaller N2 but larger P3a amplitudes, when the faces were associated with positive and negative pictures as compared to neutral pictures. These findings suggest that response inhibition is influenced by emotional arousal, when emotional stimuli are irrelevant to response selection. Additionally, for Go faces, results showed smaller N2 but larger P3a amplitudes within negative pictures as compared to neutral and positive pictures, suggesting a role of emotional valence elicited by irrelevant stimuli on response execution.
先前使用 Go/Nogo 任务的事件相关电位（ERP）研究表明，当情绪刺激与 Go 和 Nogo 试验的反应选择相关时，情绪刺激引起的唤醒会影响反应抑制。然而，由于刺激和任务设计的问题，当情绪刺激与反应选择无关时，情绪效价或唤醒是否会影响反应抑制尚不确定。因此，本研究旨在通过规避先前研究的局限性来重新研究这个问题。为了解决这个问题，三十一名年轻成年人（16 名女性和 15 名男性）被要求对一种性别（Go 试验）的经常出现的面孔做出运动反应，并对较少出现的另一种性别的面孔做出抑制反应（Nogo 试验）。至关重要的是，这些面孔被叠加在积极、消极和中性的图片上。图片以随机顺序呈现。积极和消极图片之间的唤醒值高度匹配。结果表明，与中性图片相比，当面孔与积极和消极图片相关联时，Nogo 面孔会引起更小的 N2 但更大的 P3a 幅度。这些发现表明，当情绪刺激与反应选择无关时，情绪唤醒会影响反应抑制。此外，对于 Go 面孔，与中性和积极图片相比，负性图片内的 N2 较小但 P3a 幅度较大，这表明无关刺激引起的情绪效价对反应执行有一定作用。
