Department of Psychology, University of Hull, HU6 7RX Hull, UK.
Acta Derm Venereol. 2022 Apr 7;102:adv00691. doi: 10.2340/actadv.v102.1626.
Attention is known to modulate itch intensity. In contrast, the reverse relationship, i.e. the degree to which the presence of an acute itch affects attention, is currently not well understood. The aims of this study were to investigate whether acute itch induces an attentional bias towards or away from visual itch-related stimuli, and if so, whether it occurs in the early or later stages of processing. A volunteer sample of 60 healthy individuals were subjected to a skin prick (either histamine or placebo), followed by completion of a spatial cueing paradigm using itch-related and neutral words as cues, in order to obtain reaction time estimates of attentional bias. The results suggest that experience of acute itch induces attentional avoidance of visual itch threats. This attentional avoidance occurs at a later processing stage in the form of facilitated disengagement of attention from itch and/or delayed disengagement from neutral information.
注意力已知可以调节瘙痒强度。相反，目前对相反的关系，即急性瘙痒的存在对注意力的影响程度，还不是很清楚。本研究的目的是探讨急性瘙痒是否会引起对视觉瘙痒相关刺激的注意偏向，以及如果是这样，这种偏向是发生在处理的早期还是晚期。我们对 60 名健康志愿者进行了皮肤刺痛（无论是组胺还是安慰剂），然后使用与瘙痒相关的和中性的词作为线索完成了一个空间提示范式，以获得注意力偏向的反应时间估计。结果表明，急性瘙痒的体验会引起对视觉瘙痒威胁的注意力回避。这种注意力回避发生在处理的后期阶段，表现为瘙痒信息的注意容易脱离和/或对中性信息的注意脱离延迟。
