Aversive conditioning, anxiety, and the strategic control of attention
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 7149997 |
|---|---|
| Authors | David S Lee (0000-0002-5984-8861, Mitchell Institute, corresponding author), Andrew Clements, Andrew Clement (0000-0001-6319-4453, Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Millsaps College, Jackson), Laurent Grégoire (0000-0002-3519-6395, Texas A&M University), Brian A Anderson (0000-0002-6620-3703, Texas A&M University) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 39 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 476-484 |
| Publication date | 2025-02-17 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Cognition & Emotion (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0269-9931 • E-ISSN: 1464-0600 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/02699931.2024.2413360 |
| PMID | 39431977 |
| OpenAlex | W4403602552 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 44 |
What we pay attention to is influenced by both reward learning and aversive conditioning. Although early attention tends to be biased toward aversively conditioned stimuli, sustained ignoring of such stimuli is also possible. How aversive conditioning influences how a person chooses to search, or the strategic control of attention, has not been explored. In the present study, participants learned an association between a colour and an aversive outcome during a training phase, and in a subsequent test phase searched for one of two targets presented on each trial; one target was rendered in the aversively conditioned colour (CS+) and the other in a neutral colour (CS-). Given the distribution of colour stimuli in the search array, it was more optimal to search for and report a target in one of the two colours on some trials. Our results demonstrate that participants were biased away from the CS+ target, which resulted in non-optimal search on some trials. Surprisingly, rather than accentuate this bias, greater state anxiety was associated with a stronger tendency to find and report the CS+ target. Our findings have implications for our understanding of the learning-dependent control of attention and abnormal attentional biases observed in high-anxious individuals
Anxiety · Attentional control · Cognition · Cognitive psychology · Conditioning · Developmental psychology · Psychiatry · Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes · Memory and Neural Mechanisms · Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies · Neuroscience · Psychology
Fears, phobias, and preparedness
Control of goal-directed and stimulus-driven attention in the brain
Neural Mechanisms of Selective Visual Attention
The Role of Inhibition in Avoiding Distraction by Salient Stimuli
Value-driven attentional capture
Involuntary covert orienting is contingent on attentional control settings.
How brains beware
Top–down and bottom–up control of visual selection
The Psychophysics Toolbox
Selection history contributes to suboptimal attention strategies
The influence of threat on the efficiency of goal-directed attentional control
Statistical learning facilitates the strategic use of attentional control
Consequences of Automatic Evaluation
How does the attention system learn from aversive outcomes
Is emotional Stroop interference linked to affective responses? Evidence from skin conductance and facial electromyography
Motivated suppression of value- and threat-modulated attentional capture
On the automaticity of attentional orienting to threatening stimuli
Instructional learning of threat-related attentional capture is modulated by state anxiety
Threat-related attentional bias in anxious and nonanxious individuals
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 2 |
| Citation span | 2026 - 2026 (1) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |