Emotion Trumps Attention: Using Prepulse Startle Probe Methodology to Assess Cognitive Processing of Television

Abstract

The evoked startle reflex (SR) has proven effective in measuring attention to simple stimuli; however, an initial investigation of the SR during television viewing found that emotion dominated the responses. This article reports an experiment that paired the acoustic startle probe with a sub-startle threshold acoustic prepulse. The interval between these two acoustic stimuli was varied while participants watched emotional television. When a startle probe closely follows the prepulse (< 500 ms), the SR is attenuated (known as prepulse inhibition). Previous work with simple stimuli demonstrated that at short intervals, the degree of inhibition indexes attention, and at longer intervals, the SR indexes emotion. Current data show a strong effect for emotion and for prepulse inhibition, but there is no evidence of attentional modulation during television viewing. SRs were largest during unpleasant scenes at every interval, which accords with the emotion-driven pattern. This replicates previous findings suggesting that startle probe methodology is a reliable measure of emotional responding to television. However, unlike simple stimuli, the SR appears not to index attention to television. The larger effect of emotion corresponds with past work suggesting that emotional responses to television are greater in magnitude than those to affective pictures.