Gilioli Anna, Borelli Eleonora, Serafini Luana, Pesciarelli Francesca
Department of Biomedical, Metabolic and Neural Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Emilia-Romagna, Italy.
Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Emilia-Romagna, Italy.
Front Psychol. 2023 Sep 8;14:1201581. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1201581. eCollection 2023.
Pain plays a fundamental role in the well-being of the individual, and its semantic content may have specific properties compared to other negative domains (i.e., fear and anger) which allows the cognitive system to detect it with priority. Considering the influence of the affective context in which stimuli (targets) are evaluated, it is possible that their valence could be differentially processed if preceded by negative stimuli (primes) associated with pain than negative stimuli not associated with pain. Thus, the present study aims to investigate the electrophysiological correlates of the implicit processing of words with pain content by using an affective priming paradigm.
Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded while participants were presented with positive and negative word targets (not associated with pain) that were preceded by positive, negative (not associated with pain), and pain word primes. Participants were asked to judge the valence of the target word.
Results showed faster reaction times (RTs) in congruent conditions, especially when the negative target was preceded by a pain prime rather than a positive one. ERPs analyses showed no effect of pain at an early-stage processing (N400), but a larger waveform when the pain prime preceded the positive prime on the LPP.
These results reaffirm the importance that valence has in establishing the priority with which stimuli are encoded in the environment and highlight the role that pain has in the processing of stimuli, supporting the hypothesis according to which the valence and the semantics of a stimulus interact with each other generating a specific response for each type of emotion.
疼痛在个体的幸福感中起着根本性作用，与其他负面领域（即恐惧和愤怒）相比，其语义内容可能具有特定属性，这使得认知系统能够优先检测到它。考虑到评估刺激（目标）时情感背景的影响，如果与疼痛相关的负面刺激（启动刺激）先于与疼痛无关的负面刺激出现，那么它们的效价可能会被不同地处理。因此，本研究旨在通过使用情感启动范式来探究具有疼痛内容的词语的内隐加工的电生理相关性。
在参与者看到由积极、消极（与疼痛无关）和疼痛词语启动刺激所引导的积极和消极词语目标（与疼痛无关）时，记录事件相关电位（ERP）。要求参与者判断目标词语的效价。
结果显示在一致条件下反应时间（RT）更快，特别是当消极目标由疼痛启动刺激而非积极启动刺激引导时。ERP分析显示在早期加工阶段（N400）疼痛没有影响，但在晚期正电位（LPP）上，当疼痛启动刺激先于积极启动刺激时波形更大。
这些结果再次证实了效价在确定刺激在环境中编码的优先级方面的重要性，并突出了疼痛在刺激加工中的作用，支持了这样一种假设，即刺激的效价和语义相互作用，为每种类型的情绪产生特定反应。
