Music to my ears, goal for my eyes? Music reward modulates gaze disengagement from negative stimuli in dysphoria

Abstract

Attentional bias for negative information, i.e. difficulties in disengagement from negative stimuli, is considered to be one of the core mechanisms involved in the onset and maintenance of depression. However, current attention training procedures aimed at reducing this bias have shown limited success. In addition to the reliability and validity concerns generated by the use of dot-probe paradigm in these procedures, an important factor is the limited consideration of motivational influences in the use of attention training. Therefore, in the current study we examined whether goal stimuli, reinforced with music reward, can modulate attention for negative information in dysphoric individuals. Using a novel attention task which measures gaze disengagement from negative faces, we found that dysphoric individuals displayed greater difficulties in disengaging eye-gaze from negative and directing it towards standard neutral stimuli, as compared to non-dysphorics. However, when using reward-reinforced goal stimuli, dysphoric individuals were as quick as non-dysphorics in disengaging attention from negative stimuli in order to engage with goal-related stimuli. These results provide preliminary evidence for the modulating role of music-reinforced goals in the attention system of depressed individuals, and highlight how music-reinforced goals can be incorporated in current attention training procedures to improve outcomes.

Efficacy of attention bias modification training for depressed adults: a randomized clinical trial

“…The study of attentional biases and ABMT would benefit from identifying more reliable outcomes, novel and psychometrically validated tasks, and the use of multiple measures of attention bias to enable latent variable modeling of bias as potential ways forward. In addition, alternative approaches to modifying negative attentional bias (e.g., Godara et al, 2019;Shamai-Leshem et al, 2020) may be worth exploring as stronger empirical tests of whether modifying negative attentional bias reduces depression symptom severity over time if these methods can achieve greater target engagement than what was demonstrated in this study.…”

“…In addition, alternative approaches to modifying negative attentional bias (e.g. Godara, Sanchez-Lopez, & De Raedt, 2019;Shamai-Leshem, Lazarov, Pine, & Bar-Haim, 2020) may be worth exploring as stronger empirical tests of whether modifying negative attentional bias reduces depression symptom severity over time if these methods can achieve greater target engagement than what was demonstrated in this study.…”

Looking for carrots, watching out for sticks: A gaze-contingent approach towards training contextual goal-dependent affective attention flexibility

“…Correspondingly, recent studies employing dysphoric individuals found that attention bias for negative stimuli, i.e. difficulty to disengage from negative material, could be modulated using music-rewarded and white noise-punished top down goals (Godara, Sanchez-Lopez, De Raedt, 2019;2021). Therefore, in the current study we used music reward and white noise punishment reinforced top-down goals to train attention towards affective stimuli in dysphoric individuals.…”

Manipulating avoidance motivation to modulate attention bias for negative information in dysphoria: An eye-tracking study

“…By manipulating the instrumentality of avoidance motivation, attention to negative information can be balanced across contexts. In a recent study it was found that rewards (music and earning money) can also be used to modulate attention away from negative stimuli in dysphoric individuals (Godara, Sanchez-Lopez, & De Raedt, 2019). Drawing on these results, future training procedures could employ both reward approach and punishment avoidance components to modulate attention in a contextual manner, in order to improve adaptive, situation-specific emotional responding.…”