Modulation of performance during executive function tasks by emotional salience of stimuli (Modulación del desempeño en tareas de funciones ejecutivas por saliencia emocional de los estímulos)

Abstract

Because emotional salience has a critical effect on cognitive processing, its effect on core executive functions has not been considered much. This study compares reaction time and accuracy of the response in the three core executive functions. The 92 students who participated in the study were assigned to two groups and performed a variety of core executive functions tests: inhibitory control, working memory and cognitive flexibility tests in versions where the stimuli had high emotional salience and low emotional salience. Each test evaluated performance according to accuracy of the response and reaction times. The results showed that high emotional salience is a characteristic of the stimuli that, in general, favours the speed and accuracy of answers in visual WM tasks and in IC processes but affects CF tasks depending on the level.

Modulation of executive functioning by social stress: a behavioural study ( Modulación del funcionamiento ejecutivo por estrés social: un estudio conductual )

“…All executive functioning assessment tasks were previously adapted and tested before their application to a Chilean university sample (see Cerić et al, 2023).…”

“…Si bien los tres subprocesos a la base de las FEs actúan muchas veces de manera conjunta e incluso indiferenciable a nivel neurocognitivo (Jurado & Rosselli, 2007), es posible sustraer de la literatura algunas tareas ampliamente utilizadas que permiten una evaluación tanto a nivel conductual (Cerić et al, 2023), como también una evaluación de la actividad cerebral asociada a la resolución de cada tarea (Ahumada-Méndez et al, 2022). De esta manera, se hace posible avanzar en la comprensión no sólo del desempeño conductual de cada uno de los sujetos en las diferentes tareas de funcionamiento ejecutivo, en cuanto a subprocesos involucrados, sino que también profundizar en la comprensión de los diferentes recursos neurocognitivos que explicarían estos desempeños.…”

“…Todas las tareas de evaluación de funcionamiento ejecutivo fueron previamente adaptadas y testeadas antes de su aplicación en una muestra universitaria chilena (ver Cerić et al, 2023).…”

“…Although the three subprocesses at the basis of EFs often act jointly and even indistinguishably at the neurocognitive level (Jurado & Rosselli, 2007), it is possible to subtract from the literature some widely used tasks that allow an evaluation both at the behavioural level (Cerić et al, 2023) as well as an evaluation of brain activity associated with the resolution of each task (Ahumada-Méndez et al, 2022). In this way, it becomes possible to advance in our understanding not only of the behavioural performance in the different executive functioning tasks, in terms of the subprocesses involved, but also of the different neurocognitive resources that would explain these performances.…”