Early Stages Of Information Processing Research Articles

What Can Physiology Tell Us about State of Interest?

The state of interest as a positive emotion is associated with the ability to comprehend new information and/or to better consolidate already perceived information, to increase the attention level to the object, to increase informational processing, and also to influence such processes as learning and motivation. The aim of this study was to reveal oculomotor correlates that can predict the locus of interest in cases of people perceiving educational information from different areas of knowledge presented as text or multimedia content. Sixty (60) volunteers participated in the study (50% males, mean age 22.20 ± 0.51). The stimuli consisted of 16 texts covering a wide range of topics, each accompanied by a comprehension question and an interest assessment questionnaire. It was found that the multimedia content type triggered more visual attention and gave an advantage in the early stages of information processing. The first fixation duration metric for the multimedia stimuli allowed u to characterize the subjective interest assessment. Overall, the results suggest the potential role of eye-tracking in evaluating educational content and it emphasizes the importance of developing solutions based on this method to enhance the effectiveness of the educational process.

Crossmodal Associations and Working Memory in the Brain.

Crossmodal associations between stimuli from different sensory modalities could emerge in non-synesthetic people and be stored in working memory to guide goal-directed behaviors. This chapter reviews a plethora of studies in this field to summarize where, when, and how crossmodal associations and working memory are processed. It has been found that in those brain regions that are traditionally considered as unimodal primary sensory areas, neural activity could be influenced by crossmodal sensory signals at temporally very early stage of information processing. This phenomenon could not be due to feedback projections from higher level associative areas. Sequentially, neural processes would then occur in associative cortical areas including the posterior parietal cortex and prefrontal cortex. Neural oscillations in multiple frequency bands may reflect brain activity in crossmodal associations, and it is likely that neural synchrony is related to potential neural mechanisms underlying these processes. Primary sensory areas and associative areas coordinate together through neural synchrony to fulfil crossmodal associations and to guide working memory performance.

The neuroelectrophysiological and behavioral effects of transcranial direct current stimulation on executive vigilance under a continuous monotonous condition.

A prolonged period of vigilance task will lead to vigilance decrement and a drop in cognitive efficiency. Although transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) can be used to improve cognitive performance following vigilance decrement, the findings in this area of study are inconsistent. This study aims to identify the neuroelectrophysiological and behavioral effects of tDCS over the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) on executive vigilance under a continuous monotonous condition. We recruited 29 participants who randomly received 30 min active or sham tDCS before the vigilance task (anode electrode at the left DLPFC, cathode electrode at the right supraorbital area). Participants completed four sessions of vigilance task and five sessions of self-report sleepiness, Oddball task, and Go/Nogo task, for a total of about 5 h. EEG was acquired in real-time throughout the experiment. Repeated measures of ANOVA were utilized to analyze the evolution of each metric with task-on-time. The results demonstrated that subjective arousal state, vigilance performance, event-related potentials (ERPs), and EEG power were significantly affected by time on task. Brain stimulation did not significantly affect the evolution of subjective and objective executive vigilance performance, but significantly modulated spontaneous activity in the alpha and beta bands across the entire brain. The continuous enhancement of the prefrontal cortex increased P2 amplitude for the Oddball task, which was associated with the enhancement of the early stage of information processing. P3 amplitude had a temporary enhancement effect, which significantly decreased following a cognitive fatigue. tDCS had a continuous enhancement effect on N2 amplitude for the Go/Nogo task, which was associated with the enhanced inhibition of distracting stimuli. Together, the current data suggest that anodal tDCS over left DLPFC possibly enhances the early stage of relevant information processing and the inhibitory control of distracting stimuli during a continuous and monotonous vigilance task.

Are People Able to Disentangle Perceptual and Conceptual Fluency? Evidence from Artificial Grammar Learning Experiment

The heuristic of information processing fluency plays an important role in making judgments. Some sources of processing fluency can be relevant or irrelevant to the content of a judgment. In this study, we aim to check whether individuals can distinguish different sources of fluency or fluency has a general effect on judgments. We used an artificial grammar learning paradigm (AGL) and tested the effects of different fluency sources (grammaticality and perceptual noise) on the judgment of grammaticality or of subjective ease of reading. It was found that both grammaticality and perceptual noise affected grammaticality judgements: the grammatical and the less noisy strings were evaluated more often as grammatical. However, only the perceptual noise affected judgments of subjective ease of reading. The results obtained provide evidence that fluency may contribute to the effects of implicit learning. It is possible that the processing fluency heuristic is the additional factor of judgement in the lack of explicit knowledge. Perhaps, perceptual noise provided almost complete explicit information for judgment of ease of reading; hence there was no need for additional heuristics. Another possible explanation is that perceptual fluency sources affect the early stages of information processing in a mandatory manner, unlike the conceptual ones. Overall, results are better explained by the non-specificity fluency hypothesis supporting the impossibility to distinguish between different fluency sources.

Non-strategic detection of identity-threatening information: Epistemic validation and identity defense may share a common cognitive basis.

Readers use prior knowledge to evaluate the validity of statements and detect false information without effort and strategic control. The present study expands this research by exploring whether people also non-strategically detect information that threatens their social identity. Participants (N = 77) completed a task in which they had to respond to a “True” or “False” probe after reading true, false, identity-threatening, or non-threatening sentences. Replicating previous studies, participants reacted more slowly to a positive probe (“True”) after reading false (vs. true) sentences. Notably, participants also reacted more slowly to a positive probe after reading identity-threatening (vs. non-threatening) sentences. These results provide first evidence that identity-threatening information, just as false information, is detected at a very early stage of information processing and lends support to the notion of a routine, non-strategic identity-defense mechanism.

A chronometric model of the relationship between frontal midline theta functional connectivity and human intelligence.

Individual differences in cognitive control have been suggested to act as a domain-general bottleneck constraining performance in a variety of cognitive ability measures, including but not limited to fluid intelligence, working memory capacity, and processing speed. However, owing to psychometric problems associated with the measurement of individual differences in cognitive control, it has been challenging to empirically test the assumption that individual differences in cognitive control underlie individual differences in cognitive abilities. In the present study, we addressed these issues by analyzing the chronometry of intelligence-related differences in midfrontal global theta connectivity, which has been shown to reflect cognitive control functions. We demonstrate in a sample of 98 adults, who completed a cognitive control task while their electroencephalogram was recorded, that individual differences in midfrontal global theta connectivity during stages of higher-order information-processing explained 65% of the variance in fluid intelligence. In comparison, task-evoked theta connectivity during earlier stages of information processing was not related to fluid intelligence. These results suggest that more intelligent individuals benefit from an adaptive modulation of theta-band synchronization during the time-course of information processing. Moreover, they emphasize the role of interregional goal-directed information-processing for cognitive control processes in human intelligence and support theoretical accounts of intelligence, which propose that individual differences in cognitive control processes give rise to individual differences in cognitive abilities. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Neural changes in early visual processing after 6\xa0months of mindfulness training in older adults

Mindfulness has been shown to improve attentional performance, which is known to decline in aging. Long-latency electroencephalographic (EEG) event-related potential (ERP) changes have been reported immediately after mindfulness training, however the enduring stability of these effects is unknown. Furthermore, the ability of mindfulness to impact earlier stages of information processing is unclear. We examined neural activation using high density EEG in older adults engaged in mindfulness training to examine the long-term stability of training effects. After 6 months of training, mindfulness practitioners displayed enhanced neural activation during sensory encoding and perceptual processing of a visual cue. Enhanced perceptual processing of a visual cue was associated with increased neural activation during post-perceptual processing of a subsequent target. Similar changes were not observed in a control group engaged in computer-based attention training over the same period. Neural changes following mindfulness training were accompanied by behavioural improvements in attentional performance. Our results are suggestive of increased efficiency of the neural pathways subserving bottom-up visual processing together with an enhanced ability to mobilise top-down attentional processes during perceptual and post-perceptual processing following mindfulness training. These results indicate that mindfulness may enhance neural processes known to deteriorate in normal aging and age-related neurodegenerative diseases.

Comparative Analysis of Indicators of the Early Stages of Sensory and Sensorimotor Information Processing in Aggressive and Nonaggressive Schizophrenia Patients

Objective. To study the characteristics of the early stages of sensory (inhibition of the P50 event-related potential) and sensorimotor (prestimulus modification of the acoustic startle reaction (ASR)) information processing in patients with schizophrenia taking account of their behavioral characteristics. Materials and methods. Two groups of patients were investigated using oculography and electroencephalography: aggressive patients (group A, 44 subjects) and nonaggressive patients (group NA, 27 subjects); a control group of 48 healthy subjects were also studied. Patients’ mental status was assessed on the PANSS. Results and conclusions. These studies identified features characteristic of schizophrenia patients, particularly increases in the latent period of ASR, deficiency of prestimulus inhibition (PSI) (with delay intervals of 60 msec), and inhibition of P50 relative to normal. The aggressivity factor influenced the lateralized features of these deviations in ASR only in group A. Group NA showed an increase in baseline ASR amplitude and a decrease in prestimulus ASR amplitude. Analysis of P50 showed a significant increase in amplitude and a decrease in latency in responses to the second stimulus in group NA. A significant increase on the G14 scale (Poor impulse control) and the nature of its correlation with ASR and P50 measures in group A suggested that increased impulsivity was an important factor in aggressive behavior in the cohort of patients studied here. The characteristics of ASR and P50 typical of group NA provided evidence of increased sensitivity to external stimuli, which may be associated with personality features inhibiting aggression. These results led to the conclusion that measures of the early stages of information processing can be regarded as potential predictors of aggressive behavior in schizophrenia patients.

Social information rapidly prioritizes overt but not covert attention in a joint spatial cueing task

Coordinating actions with others is crucial for our survival. Our ability to see what others are seeing and to align our visual attention with them facilitates these joint actions. In the present research, we set out to increase our understanding of such joint attention by investigating the extent to which social information would be able to prioritize overt (when moving the eyes to attend) and covert (when shifting attention without eye movements) attention in a joint spatial cueing task. Participants saw a cue and detected a target at the same or a different location alongside an unseen partner of either higher or lower social rank. In a novel twist, participants were led to believe that the cue was connected to the gaze location of their partner. In Experiment 1, where participants were told to not move their eyes (covert attention), the partner's social rank did not change how quickly participants detected targets. But in Experiment 2, where participants were free to move their eyes naturally (overt attention), inhibition of return effects (slower responses to cued than uncued targets) were modulated by their partner's social rank. These social top-down effects occurred already at a short SOA of 150 ms. Our findings suggest that overt attention might provide a key tool for joint action, as it is penetrable for social information at the early stages of information processing.

The comparative study of the early stages of sensory and sensory-motor information processing in aggressive and non-aggressive schizophrenic patients

To study the early stages of sensory (P50 suppression) and sensorimotor (prepulse modification of acoustic startle reaction - ASR) information processing in aggressive and non-aggressive patients with schizophrenia. Two groups (aggressive group A, 44 s. and non-aggressive group NA, 27 s.) and 48 healthy people were studied using oculography and encephalography. Symptoms of schizophrenia were assessed by PANSS. The analysis of ASR and P50 revealed the increased ASR latency, deficit of prepulse inhibition (PPI) with 60 ms leading interval, and P50 suppression in patients compared to controls. Aggressive behavior impacted on lateral features of ASR changes in the group A. The increase of ASR amplitude and the decline of prepulse facilitation were found in the group NA. The P50 analysis revealed the increased P50 amplitude and the shortened latency in response to 2nd stimulus in the pair. The increase in scores on item G14 of the PANSS (Poor impulse control) in the group A and its correlations with ASR and P50 parameters in this group suggested the important role of impulsivity in aggressive behavior in the studied sample of aggressive patients. ASR and P50 characteristics in the group NA are associated with increased sensitivity to incoming stimuli and such personality traits as increased alertness and fear, which might inhibit aggression. Thus, indicators of the early stages of information processing can be considered as potential predictors of aggressive behavior.

Shared Sensitivity to Physical Pain and Social Evaluation

Many studies have demonstrated a link between experiences of physical pain and those of social rejection, both of which can trigger cognitive processes involved in detecting, orienting toward, or reacting to potentially threatening events. This study tested the hypothesis that healthy individuals who are more sensitive to physical pain are also more sensitive to social rejection. We recruited participants with high or low pain-sensitivity (HPS and LPS), as assessed by scores on a pain-sensitivity questionnaire and confirmed by experimental pain-sensitivity assessment. A modified social-judgment task was adopted in which participants first provided expectations about being liked/disliked by “peers”, and then received “peers” feedback indicating acceptance or rejection. While both groups rated rejection as more unpleasant than acceptance, this difference was greater in the HPS group. Electroencephalographic results showed that only participants in the HPS group exhibited greater early delta/theta-oscillations (δ/θ-oscillations) in response to rejection than to acceptance, regardless of whether the feedback was expected or unexpected. However, both groups consistently exhibited greater late δ/θ-oscillations in response to rejection when the feedback was unexpected. These results suggest that participants in the HPS group were more sensitive to social cues signaling acceptance or rejection at early stages of information processing. Furthermore, neither early nor late δ/θ-oscillations following nonsocial feedback (correct or incorrect time-estimation) differed between groups. Altogether, these results supported the idea of shared sensitivity in detecting potentially physical and social threats in the environment. PerspectivesThis study showed the greater emotional reactions and early-latency δ/θ-oscillations in response to social evaluation among healthy individuals with high pain sensitivity. It supports the idea of shared sensitivity to physical pain and social evaluation, which could be governed by a common system for detecting and monitoring potentially environmental threats.

Temperament moderates developmental changes in vigilance to emotional faces in infants: Evidence from an eye-tracking study.

Affect-biased attention reflects the prioritization of attention to stimuli that individuals deem to be motivationally and/or affectively salient. Normative affect-biased attention is early-emerging, providing an experience-expectant function for socioemotional development. Evidence is limited regarding how reactive and regulatory aspects of temperament may shape maturational changes in affect-biased attention that operate at the earliest stages of information processing. This study implemented a novel eye-tracking paradigm designed to capture attention vigilance in infants. We assessed temperamental negative affect (NA) and attention control (AC) using laboratory observations and parent-reports, respectively. Among infants (N=161 in the final analysis) aged 4 to 24months (Mean=12.05, SD=5.46; 86 males), there was a significant age effect on fixation latency to emotional versus neutral faces only in infants characterized with high NA and high AC. Specifically, in infants with these temperament traits, older infants showed shorter latency (i.e., greater vigilance) toward neutral faces, which are potentially novel and unfamiliar to infants. The age effect on vigilance toward emotional faces was not significant. The findings support the argument that the development of affect-biased attention is associated with multiple temperament processes that potentially interact over time.

Evidence for an attention bias toward disgust in contamination fear

Although attention biases are common in various anxiety disorders, there is no consensus yet regarding attentional bias in obsessive–compulsive disorder. We assessed attention bias toward images involving contamination and disgust using an emotional attentional blink paradigm in a sample of university students high (HCF) or low (LCF) in contamination fear. Neutral, general-threat-, contamination-, and disgust-related images (T1) were presented followed by a discrimination task (T2) 200, 500, or 800 ms later within a rapid serial visual presentation stream of 20 images. The HCF group was overall less accurate on the attentional blink task. Response accuracy differed by image type and lag in the two groups at the trend level and revealed a large drop in performance 200 ms following presentation of disgusting images in the HCF group. No such differences were observed at later lags in the task. There were increases in negative affect following the task for the HCF but not the LCF group, which were correlated with contamination fear scores. The results suggest that a disgust-related attention bias may be present at early stages of information processing in people with contamination fear.

On the interrelation of 1/f neural noise and norepinephrine system activity during motor response inhibition.

Several lines of evidence suggest that there is a close interrelation between the degree of noise in neural circuits and the activity of the norepinephrine (NE) system, yet the precise nexus between these aspects is far from being understood during human information processing and cognitive control in particular. We examine this nexus during response inhibition in n = 47 healthy participants. Using high-density EEG recordings, we estimate neural noise by calculating "1/f noise" of those data and integrate these EEG parameters with pupil diameter data as an established indirect index of NE system activity. We show that neural noise is reduced when cognitive control processes to inhibit a prepotent/automated response are exerted. These neural noise variations were confined to the theta frequency band, which has also been shown to play a central role during response inhibition and cognitive control. There were strong positive correlations between the 1/f neural noise parameter and the pupil diameter data within the first 250 ms after the Nogo stimulus presentation at centro-parietal electrode sites. No such correlations were evident during automated responding on Go trials. Source localization analyses using standardized low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography show that inferior parietal areas are activated in this time period in Nogo trials. The data suggest an interrelation of NE system activity and neural noise within early stages of information processing associated with inferior parietal areas when cognitive control processes are required. The data provide the first direct evidence for the nexus between NE system activity and the modulation of neural noise during inhibitory control in humans. NEW & NOTEWORTHY This is the first study showing that there is a nexus between norepinephrine system activity and the modulation of neural noise or scale-free neural activity during inhibitory control in humans. It does so by integrating pupil diameter data with analysis of EEG neural noise.

Behavioral and Auditory Electrophysiological Rebound as a Compensatory Response to the Reinforcing Effects of Morphine

Auditory-evoked potentials (AEPs) can be modified by associative learning, where the appearance of learned compensatory responses (CCRs) may result in the emergence of drug withdrawal symptoms and relapse. Although CCRs’ influence on later attentive and cognitive domains has been extensively examined, contextual conditioned tolerance occurring in preattentive mechanisms operating at earlier stages of information processing has remained largely unexplored. To extend our knowledge on this subject, compensatory changes on the motor and emotional aspects of behavior evoked by contextual cues were investigated with an electronic open field in morphine-pretreated rats challenged with two morphine overdoses (40 and 80 mg/kg). CCRs influence on the AEPs recorded in the central nucleus of the inferior colliculus (CIC) was analyzed with the help of a field potential recording device and a two-chamber shuttle box placed inside a Faraday cage system. The emergence of electrophysiological CCRs was analyzed by recording AEP latency and amplitude elicited in the central nucleus of the IC (CIC) with the aid of a field potential recording device and a two-chamber shuttle box placed inside a Faraday cage system. Behavioral analysis indicated that CCRs ensue in non-familiar contexts. Electrophysiological data revealed increases in the amplitude of AEPs evoked in a non-familiar context. Our results indicate that behavioral learning responses emerge following Pavlovian conditioning even with the use of low and regular doses of morphine over a short-term treatment. Changes in the CIC electrophysiology may indicate that the development of drug dependence occurs covertly in the early stages of sensory information processing.

Lack of correlation between phonetic magnetic mismatch field and plasma d-serine levels in humans

ObjectiveUncovering molecular bases for auditory language processing in the human brain is a fundamental scientific challenge. The power and latency of the magnetic mismatch field (MMF) elicited by phoneme change, which are magnetoencephalographic indices of language function in its early stage of information processing, are theoretically thought to be modulated by N-methyl-d-aspartate-type glutamate receptor (NMDAR) function, but no study has yet assessed this possibility. We have thus sought to demonstrate an association between phonetic MMF power/latency and levels of plasma d-serine, an intrinsic co-agonist of glycine binding sites on NMDAR, in adults. MethodsThe MMF response to phoneme changes was recorded using 204-channel magnetoencephalography in 61 healthy, right-handed, Japanese adults. Plasma levels of d- and l-serine were measured for each participant. ResultsWe did not find a significant correlation between MMF power/latency and plasma serine levels. ConclusionsDespite a sufficient sample size, we failed to find an association between the physiological markers of the early stage of information processing of language in the auditory cortex and biomarkers indexing glutamatergic function. SignificanceOur study did not indicate that a molecular index of glutamatergic function could be a surrogate marker for the early stage of information processing of language in humans.

F221. SELECTIVE ATTENTION BIAS FOR FEAR STIMULI AND HALLUCINATION IN PATIENTS WITH SCHIZOPHRENIA: A PRELIMINARY STUDY

BackgroundSeveral studies have shown the association between affective dysregulation and severity of psychotic symptoms in schizophrenic patients. Attentional biases, which operate automatically to favor the processing of emotionally negative information in early stages of information processing, are known to play a causal role in the etiology of anxiety and other negative affective states. This study was conducted to evaluate the association between selective attention bias for fear stimuli and psychotic symptoms in patients with schizophrenia.MethodsA total of 66 patients with schizophrenia were included in the study. Attentional biases were measured with the dot-probe task with facial expression of neutral and fear emotional. To measure the psychotic features of the participants, the Positive and Negative Symptom Scale (PANSS), Psychotic Symptom Rating Scale (PSYRATS), the Scale to Assess Unawareness of Mental Disorder (SUMD), and Clinical Global Impression–Severity scale (CGI-S) were used.ResultsAttentional vigilance scores were calculated by subtracting the median RT in congruent trials (dot at the position of the fear face) from the median RT in incongruent trials (dot at the position of the neutral face) Attentional vigilance scores was moderately correlated with the hallucination subscale of PSYTATS (r=0.268, p=0.029) in the participants. No correlation was found between selective attention bias and the scores of PANSS, PSYTATS-delusion, SUMD, and CGI-S. When the participants were divided into biased and non-biased groups by the attentional vigilance scores of +40 msec, no significant difference was found in the clinical measures. However, a statistical trend was found in hallucination severities between the biased and non-biased groups (p=0.092).DiscussionAs a pilot study, the results suggest that the emotional information processing might affect the subjective severity of psychotic features in schizophrenia. Further study would be needed to clarify this association.

Lost in distractors: Reduced Autobiographical Memory Specificity and dispersed activation spreading over distractors in working memory

Studies on autobiographical memory retrieval highlight the prominence of rapid and direct access to a specific event memory. Because it has been believed that autobiographical memory retrieval mostly relies on an effortful generative process, there is little empirical evidence on the early stage of information processing that contributes to autobiographical memory specificity (AMS). Therefore, we investigated the associations between AMS and automatic activation of information stimulated by rapid presentation of emotional words. Study 1 involved a visual search task to assess activation of various distractors in working memory. Participants with reduced AMS showed a tendency to activate distractors that were not semantically associated with preceding cues. In Study 2, we manipulated the levels of AMS by using a computerized version of Memory Specificity Training (c-MeST) to observe the changes in the activation of distractors. Results showed that increases in AMS were associated with decreases in activation of cue-unassociated distractors. These findings suggest that reduced AMS can be characterized by dispersed activation spreading over semantically unassociated distractors in automatic information selection of working memory. Because we also found an association between depressive symptoms and AMS, the role of automatic information processing in the relation between reduced AMS and depression is discussed.

回避型依恋者对消极情绪信息防御性加工特征

准确加工情绪信息在人际关系管理及一般社会功能上起重要作用。不安全依恋风格影响个体的情绪加工偏向。回避型依恋者抑制消极刺激的加工，并且被看做拥有早期无意识的焦虑自我模型以及晚期控制的积极自我模型。本文主要探讨回避型依恋者加工消极情绪信息的防御性排斥特征，具体表现为一种早期警觉和晚期抑制的双重加工模型。行为证据证明了回避型依恋者在早期自动化加工阶段表现出同依恋焦虑者类似的对威胁相关信息的警觉探测。ERP成分也体现了回避者早期警觉的特征，表现在N1、P2等注意警觉相关成分以及C1、P1等基于粗略视觉特征的视觉情绪刺激加工相关的早成分更为强烈的波幅上。在晚期加工阶段这类个体则表现出对消极情绪的回避抑制加工，在表情模仿任务中出现“反转的微笑”以及stroop任务中更少的干扰效应证明其在晚期加工阶段的抑制加工特征。神经层面表现为回避型个体在认知控制脑区如背外侧前额叶、眶额皮层等脑区的激活。回避者对负性情绪的高度警觉是成功回避的前提，而这一策略在个体认知资源不足时出现失效。未来研究可进一步探讨回避型依恋与警觉-抑制注意模式的因果基础；关注防御性情绪信息加工对个体健康以及关系维持的影响及后果；深入考察去激活策略功能的有效性及其神经机制；深化回避防御在临床治疗上的应用，进一步为治疗依恋混乱相关的临床策略提供新的启示。 Accurate processing of emotional information plays an important role in the management of in-terpersonal relationship and social function. Insecure attachment style effects the process of threaten related information. Individuals with avoidant pattern of attachment are assumed to repress threaten-related signals. They are assumed to have one internal working model associated with anxiety, operating out of awareness at early, automatic stages of information processing, and another positive model operating at later, cognitively controlled stages of processing. This paper discussed the defensive characteristics of negative emotion processing of avoidant attachment. Automatic vigilance followed by effortful inhibition as a cognitive defense for avoidant attachment to processing the threaten-related signals, which is expressed in a specific dual-process model of avoidant defenses included vigilance in early automatic process and avoidance in later controlled process. The evidences from various behavioral experimental paradigms included emoticon mimicry task, morph task, perceptual threshold task, as well as emotional cueing task provided support for the point of view that attachment avoidant individuals have the capacity to detect the threaten related information in certain circumstance in the early stage of information processing. This characteristic was also proved by the evidences from event-related potentials (ERP) components, which are mainly reflected in more strong amplitude in attention vigilance related components (N1, P2) and early components related to visual features-based emotion processing when presented negative emotion information in attachment avoidant individuals. However, individuals with avoidant attachment style processed negative emotion with attention inhibition at the cognitively controlled level of processing. The avoidant individual’ tendency to “smiling” in response to the angry face at the controlled level was interpreted as a repression of their earlier, automatically evoked negative emotional reaction. Coincidentally, consistent with the proposal that avoidant individuals limit attention to potentially distressing information, attachment avoidance was associated with reductions in emotional Stroop (ES) interference for threatening related stimulus. These individuals exhibited limited cognitive resources which were devoted in this phase. The evidences from functional magnetic resonance imaging showed that during the processing of negative emotion, these individuals with attachment avoidant exhibited more strong activities in brain region in charge of advanced cognitive and control function, such as the right hemisphere superior frontal gyms (rSFG), the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), the orbital frontal cortex (OFC) and so on. It can be explained that effectively avoiding processing threaten related information is based on the heightened state of vigilance for attachment avoidance. The defense strategy of attachment avoidance was considered as a secondary strategy with cognitive effort to sustain in later stage of emotion information processing. This characteristic of cognitive resource consumption made the strategy ineffective when the cognitive resource deficit. Future studies can further explore the causal basis for the relationship between avoidant attachment and vigilance-inhibi- tion attention pattern, pay attention to the impact of defensive emotional processing on individual health and the maintain of intimate relationship, explore the neural mechanism and effectiveness of the deactivation strategy and further study the application of avoid defense in clinical treatment to provide new inspiration for the treatment of attachment disorder and related clinical strategies.

Affective Priming by Eye Gaze Stimuli: Behavioral and Electrophysiological Evidence.

The present study employed the affective priming paradigm and measurements of event-related potentials (ERPs) to investigate implicit affective reactions elicited by gaze stimuli. Participants categorized positive and negative words primed by direct gaze, averted gaze and closed eyes. The behavioral response time (RT) results indicated that direct gaze implicitly elicited more positive affective reactions than did closed eyes. Analyses of the ERP responses to the target words revealed a priming effect on the N170 and an interaction on late positive potential (LPP) responses, and congruently with the behavioral results, suggested that, compared to closed eyes, direct gaze was affectively more congruent with positive words and more incongruent with negative words. The priming effect on the N170 response indicated that gaze stimuli influenced the subsequent affective word processing at an early stage of information processing. In conclusion, the present behavioral and electrophysiological evidence suggests that direct gaze automatically activates more positive affective reactions than closed eyes.