Institute of Psychology, University of Pecs, Hungary.
Department of Behavioural Sciences, Medical School, University of Pécs, Hungary.
Br J Psychol. 2020 Nov;111(4):665-682. doi: 10.1111/bjop.12429. Epub 2019 Oct 21.
Although large body of research has demonstrated the attention-grabbing nature of threat-related stimuli, threat could also facilitate attentional processes. Previous studies suggest a linear relationship between the facilitating effect of the arousal level conveyed by threat and performance on visual search tasks. Due to the temporal competition bias favouring stimuli with higher arousal level, this could be more pronounced for shorter onset times. Here, through two experiments we aimed to disentangle the two effects by using a visual search paradigm that allowed us to separate the emotional stimuli and the cognitive task. We manipulated stimulus onset time and threat intensity. Participants saw neutral and threatening pictures as priming stimuli, and then, they had to find numbers in ascending order in a matrix array. We measured the reaction time for finding the first number, and search time for finding all the numbers. Our results showed that when the priming stimulus is presented, longer threatening pictures produced longer reaction times compared to neutral ones, which was reversed with increase in arousal. We did not find any significant effects for the shorter onset time. Further theoretical and methodological implications are discussed.
尽管大量研究表明，与威胁相关的刺激具有引人注目的性质，但威胁也可以促进注意力的过程。先前的研究表明，威胁所传达的唤醒水平的促进作用与视觉搜索任务中的表现之间存在线性关系。由于时间竞争偏向于具有更高唤醒水平的刺激，因此对于较短的起始时间，这种关系可能更为明显。在这里，我们通过两个实验旨在通过使用视觉搜索范式来区分这两种效应，该范式允许我们将情绪刺激和认知任务分开。我们操纵了刺激起始时间和威胁强度。参与者将中性和威胁性图片作为启动刺激，然后，他们必须在矩阵数组中找到升序的数字。我们测量了找到第一个数字的反应时间和找到所有数字的搜索时间。我们的结果表明，当呈现启动刺激时，与中性图片相比，较长的威胁性图片会产生更长的反应时间，而随着唤醒程度的增加，这种情况则相反。我们没有发现较短起始时间的任何显著影响。进一步的理论和方法学意义进行了讨论。
