Department of Social Psychology and Quantitative Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, University of Barcelona, Spain; Institute of Neurosciences, University of Barcelona, Spain; Institut de Recerca Sant Joan de Déu, Spain.
Department of Social Psychology and Quantitative Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, University of Barcelona, Spain; Institute of Neurosciences, University of Barcelona, Spain.
Biol Psychol. 2019 Sep;146:107727. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2019.107727. Epub 2019 Jul 2.
Previous studies suggested that highly math-anxious (HMA) individuals invest more attentional resources than their low math-anxious (LMA) peers in numerical tasks, and have worse spatial skills. We aimed to explore whether they also need to apply more resources in spatial tasks. In this study, HMA and LMA individuals saw normal or mirror-reversed letters in six orientations and made mirror-normal decisions. In both groups, response times and errors increased with angular deviation from upright and the ERP mental rotation effect was found. However, HMAs were slower to respond than their LMA counterparts. Interestingly, the HMA group showed a larger P3b in greater deviations for normal letters and in all mirrored letters. Since P3b amplitude reflects the attentional resources invested in the categorization of relevant stimuli, HMA individuals may need to devote more processing effort than their LMA peers when performing mental rotation. This finding is consistent with the Attentional Control Theory.
先前的研究表明，高度数学焦虑（HMA）个体在数学任务中比其低度数学焦虑（LMA）同龄人投入更多的注意力资源，并且空间技能更差。我们旨在探讨他们是否也需要在空间任务中投入更多资源。在这项研究中，HMA 和 LMA 个体看到了六个方向的正常或镜像反转的字母，并做出了镜像-正常的判断。在两个组中，反应时间和错误随着与垂直方向的角度偏差而增加，并且发现了 ERP 心理旋转效应。然而，HMA 的反应速度比 LMA 慢。有趣的是，对于正常字母和所有镜像字母，HMA 组在较大偏差时的 P3b 反应更大。由于 P3b 幅度反映了对相关刺激进行分类所投入的注意力资源，因此 HMA 个体在进行心理旋转时可能需要比其 LMA 同龄人投入更多的处理努力。这一发现与注意控制理论一致。
