Poyato Natalia, Vazquez Carmelo
Department of Clinical Psychology, School of Psychology, Complutense University of Madrid, 28223, Madrid, Spain.
Psychol Res. 2021 Nov;85(8):2970-2979. doi: 10.1007/s00426-020-01446-6. Epub 2020 Nov 23.
As difficulties in managing the anticipation of situations is one of the characteristics of emotional problems, the study of regulatory strategies during anticipatory period anticipation is important. In the present study, attentional patterns during the anticipation period were studied. The ability of those attentional patterns to regulate mood after the event's occurrence was analyzed. An experimental paradigm was designed in which participants repeatedly anticipated emotional information. Attentional patterns in response to emotionally expressive faces (happy and sad) were recorded with an eye tracker. The results showed that the valence of the expected outcomes did affect attentional preferences. Specifically, participants spent more time looking at sad faces when they anticipated a negative rather than a positive outcome. The opposite pattern was found for happy faces. With respect to the ability to regulate the emotions of these attention patterns, it was found that emotions experienced after a negatively anticipated event were independent of previous attention patterns, while happiness experienced after a previously anticipated positive event was found to be related to attentional patterns. Specifically, people who spent more time looking at happy faces during the anticipation of a positive outcome reported higher levels of happiness after the event. In conclusion, these results indicate that during the anticipation of emotional outcomes participants implement attentional strategies, although the emotions associated with experiencing those outcomes were independent of those attentional patterns in the negative anticipation, they were found to magnify positive emotions in positive anticipation.
由于难以应对对各种情况的预期是情绪问题的特征之一，因此研究预期期间的调节策略很重要。在本研究中，对预期期间的注意力模式进行了研究。分析了这些注意力模式在事件发生后调节情绪的能力。设计了一种实验范式，让参与者反复预期情绪信息。使用眼动仪记录对情绪表达性面孔（开心和悲伤）的注意力模式。结果表明，预期结果的效价确实会影响注意力偏好。具体而言，当参与者预期负面结果而非正面结果时，他们会花更多时间看悲伤的面孔。对于开心的面孔则发现了相反的模式。关于这些注意力模式调节情绪的能力，研究发现，负面预期事件后体验到的情绪与先前的注意力模式无关，而正面预期事件后体验到的快乐则与注意力模式有关。具体而言，在预期正面结果期间花更多时间看开心面孔的人在事件发生后报告的快乐水平更高。总之，这些结果表明，在预期情绪结果期间，参与者会实施注意力策略，尽管与经历这些结果相关的情绪在负面预期中与那些注意力模式无关，但在正面预期中它们被发现会放大积极情绪。
