ADRA2B deletion variant and enhanced cognitive processing of emotional information: A meta-analytical review

Cappiello, Marcus; Meng, Ming; Rosenthal, Robert; Zhang, Weiwei

doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2018.05.010

Cited by 17 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 157 publications

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“…An enhanced positivity bias is consistent with previous research showing a working memory advantage for positive items in deletion carriers (Mammarella et al, 2016), and it suggests that in this context deletion carriers perceived ambiguous faces as being more rewarding. Thus, the present results confirm ADRA2b-dependent exaggeration of typically observed affective biases, as has been demonstrated by multiple studies (e.g., de Quervain et al, 2007;Todd et al, 2015;Todd, Muller, et al, 2013) and confirmed in a recent meta-analytic review (Xie, Cappiello, Meng, Rosenthal, & Zhang, 2018); however, they suggest that putative differences in NE availability do not influence the degree of flexibility or change in subjective perceptions of rewarding information induced by implicit-learning processes. This divergence from previous studies investigating classical conditioning (Moriceau & Sullivan, 2004) and working/recognition memory (Mammarella et al, 2016) suggests that the effects of alpha2b receptor activity on learning likely differ across learning processes (Xie et al, 2018).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

The influence of the noradrenergic/stress system on perceptual biases for reward

Ehlers

Ross

Todd

2018

Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci

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Previous research has established a role for the norepinephrine (NE)/stress system in individual differences in biases to attend to reward or punishment. Outstanding questions concern its role in the flexibility with which such biases can be changed. The goal of this preregistered study was to examine the role of the NE/stress system in the degree to which biases can be trained along the axis of valence in the direction of reward. Participants genotyped for a common deletion variant of ADRA2b (linked to altered NE availability) experienced either an acute stress induction or a control procedure. Following stress induction, a Bbias probe^task was presented before and after training. In the bias probe task, participants made forced choice judgments (happy or angry) on emotional faces with varying degrees of ambiguity. For bias training, participants viewed unambiguously angry faces in a task exploiting visual adaptation effects. The results revealed an overall shift from a slightly positive bias in categorizing faces pretraining to a more positive bias after training. Carriers of the deletion variant overall showed a more positive bias than did the noncarriers. Follow-up analyses showed that pretraining bias was a significant predictor of bias change, with those who showed a more negative bias preadaptation changing more in a positive direction. Critically, this effect was observed under control but not under stress conditions. These results suggest that the NE/stress system plays an important role in influencing traitlike biases as well as short-term changes in the tendency to perceive ambiguous stimuli as being more rewarding than threatening. Keywords Emotion. Motivation. Norephinephrine. Reward Decades of research have supported the common observation that some people see the world through rose-colored glasses, and others through lenses tinted gray (e.g., Eysenck & Eysenck, 1985). In general, we are all more likely to attend to and remember emotionally and motivationally salient environmental cues (Markovic, Anderson, & Todd, 2014; Pourtois, Schettino, & Vuilleumier, 2013). Yet, when a cue is ambiguous in signaling reward or punishment, individuals

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

The influence of the noradrenergic/stress system on perceptual biases for reward

Ehlers

Ross

Todd

2018

Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci

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“…While findings have not been entirely consistent, a recent meta-analysis (Xie, Cappiello, Meng, Rosenthal, & Zhang, 2018) found reliable effects of carrying the deletion variant on emotional enhancement of attention, perception and memory. These effects were modulated by the specific cognitive processes indexed by the task, and were overall strongest in tasks indexing attentional and perceptual processes (Xie et al, 2018). With regard to effects of the deletion variant on sensitivity to emotional valence, some studies have found deletion carriers to prioritize emotionally arousing images in general (Todd et al, 2015), whereas others have found deletion carriers to show greater biases than non-carriers towards negative (Todd et al, 2013) or positive Fairfield et al, 2019) stimuli.…”

mentioning

confidence: 93%

“…Our own research has found that carriers of the deletion variant show enhancement of emotional modulation of cognition relative to non-carriers: Deletion carriers show attentional prioritization of emotionally arousing words, enhanced neural and behavioral indices of perceptual vividness for emotionally relevant images, and stronger links between subjectively rated arousal during picture viewing and subsequent emotional enhancement of memory for the pictures (Todd et al, 2015;Todd et al, 2013;Todd et al, 2014). While findings have not been entirely consistent, a recent meta-analysis (Xie, Cappiello, Meng, Rosenthal, & Zhang, 2018) found reliable effects of carrying the deletion variant on emotional enhancement of attention, perception and memory. These effects were modulated by the specific cognitive processes indexed by the task, and were overall strongest in tasks indexing attentional and perceptual processes (Xie et al, 2018).…”

mentioning

confidence: 94%

Affectively Biased Competition: Sustained Attention is Tuned to Rewarding Expressions and is Not Modulated by Norepinephrine Receptor Gene Variant

Roberts¹,

Manaligod²,

Ross³

et al. 2019

Collabra: Psychology

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It is well established that emotionally salient stimuli evoke greater visual cortex activation than neutral ones, and can distract attention from competing tasks. Yet less is known about underlying neurobiological processes. As a proxy of population level biased competition, EEG steady-state visual evoked potentials are sensitive to competition effects from salient stimuli. Here we wished to examine whether individual differences in norepinephrine activity play a role in emotionally-biased competition. Our previous research has found robust effects of a common variation in the ADRA2B gene, coding for alpha2B norepinephrine (NE) receptors, on emotional modulation of attention and memory. In the present study, EEG was collected while 87 carriers of the ADRA2B deletion variant and 95 non-carriers (final sample) performed a change detection task in which target gratings (gabor patches) were superimposed directly over angry, happy, and neutral faces. Participants indicated the number of phase changes (0-3) in the target. Overlapping targets and distractors were flickered at a distinct driving frequencies. Relative EEG power for faces vs. targets at the driving frequency served as an index of cortical resources allocated to each of the competing stimuli. Deletion carriers and non-carriers were randomly assigned to Discovery and Replication samples and reliability of results across samples was assessed before the groups were combined for greater power. Overall happy faces evoked higher competition than angry or neutral faces; however, we observed no hypothesized effects of ADRA2B. Increased competition from happy faces was not due to the effect of low-level visual features or individuals low in social anxiety. Our results indicate that emotionally biased competition during sustained attention, while reliably observed in young adults, is not influenced by commonly observed individual differences linked to NE receptor function. They further indicate an overall pattern of affectively-biased competition for happy faces, which we interpret in relation to previously observed boundary conditions.

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“…While findings have not been entirely consistent, a recent meta--analysis (Xie, Cappiello, Meng, Rosenthal, & Zhang, 2018) found reliable effects of carrying the deletion variant on emotional enhancement of attention, perception and memory. These effects were modulated by the specific cognitive processes indexed by the task, and were overall strongest in tasks indexing attentional and perceptual processes (Xie et al, 2018). With regard to effects of the deletion variant on sensitivity to emotional valence, some studies have found deletion carriers to prioritize emotionally arousing images in general (Todd et al, 2015), whereas others have found deletion carriers to show greater biases than non--carriers towards negative (Todd et al, 2013) or positive Fairfield et al, 2019) stimuli.…”

mentioning

confidence: 93%

“…Our own research has found that carriers of the deletion variant show enhancement of emotional modulation of cognition relative to non--carriers: Deletion carriers show attentional prioritization of emotionally arousing words, enhanced neural and behavioral indices of perceptual vividness for emotionally relevant images, and stronger links between subjectively rated arousal during picture viewing and subsequent emotional enhancement of memory for the pictures (Todd et al, 2015;Todd et al, 2013;Todd et al, 2014). While findings have not been entirely consistent, a recent meta--analysis (Xie, Cappiello, Meng, Rosenthal, & Zhang, 2018) found reliable effects of carrying the deletion variant on emotional enhancement of attention, perception and memory. These effects were modulated by the specific cognitive processes indexed by the task, and were overall strongest in tasks indexing attentional and perceptual processes (Xie et al, 2018).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Affectively biased competition: sustained attention is tuned to rewarding expressions and is not modulated by norepinephrine receptor gene variant

Roberts

Manaligod

Ross

et al. 2018

Preprint

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It is well established that emotionally salient stimuli evoke greater visual cortex activation than neutral ones, and can distract attention from competing tasks. Yet less is known about underlying neurobiological processes. As a proxy of population level biased competition, EEG steady--state visual evoked potentials are sensitive to competition effects from salient stimuli.Here we wished to examine whether individual differences in norepinephrine activity play a role in emotionally--biased competition.Our previous research has found robust effects of a common variation in the ADRA2B gene, coding for alpha2B norepinephrine (NE) receptors, on emotional modulation of attention and memory. In the present study, EEG was collected while 87 carriers of the ADRA2B deletion variant and 95 non--carriers (final sample) performed a change detection task in which target gratings (gabor patches) were superimposed directly over angry, happy, and neutral faces. Participants indicated the number of phase changes (0--3) in the target. Overlapping targets and distractors were flickered at a distinct driving frequencies. Relative EEG power for faces vs. targets at the driving frequency served as an index of cortical resources allocated to each of the competing stimuli. Deletion carriers and non--carriers were randomly assigned to Discovery and Replication samples and reliability of results across samples was assessed before the groups were combined for greater power.Overall happy faces evoked higher competition than angry or neutral faces; however, we observed no hypothesized effects of ADRA2B. Increased competition from happy faces was not due to the effect of low--level visual features or individuals low in social anxiety. Our results indicate that emotionally biased competition during sustained attention, while reliably observed in young adults, is not influenced by commonly observed individual differences linked to NE receptor function. They further indicate an overall pattern of affectively--biased competition for happy faces, which we interpret in relation to previously observed boundary conditions.

show abstract

ADRA2B deletion variant and enhanced cognitive processing of emotional information: A meta-analytical review

Cited by 17 publications

References 157 publications

The influence of the noradrenergic/stress system on perceptual biases for reward

The influence of the noradrenergic/stress system on perceptual biases for reward

Affectively Biased Competition: Sustained Attention is Tuned to Rewarding Expressions and is Not Modulated by Norepinephrine Receptor Gene Variant

Affectively biased competition: sustained attention is tuned to rewarding expressions and is not modulated by norepinephrine receptor gene variant

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