Stereotype-based stressors facilitate emotional memory neural network connectivity and encoding of negative information to degrade math self-perceptions among women

Abstract

Stress engendered by stereotype threatening situations may facilitate encoding of negative, stereotype confirming feedback received during a performance among women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). It is unclear, however, whether this process is comprised of the same neurophysiological mechanisms evident in any emotional memory encoding context, or if this encoding bias directly undermines positive self-perceptions in the stigmatized domain. A total of 160 men and women completed a math test that provided veridical positive and negative feedback, a memory test for feedback, and math self-enhancing and valuing measures in a stereotype threatening or neutral context while continuous electroencephalography activity and startle probe responses to positive and negative feedback was recorded. Indexing amygdala activity to feedback via startle responses and emotional memory network connectivity elicited during accurate recognition of positive and negative feedback via graph analyses, only stereotype threatened women encoded negative feedback better when they exhibited increased amygdala activity and emotional memory network connectivity in response to said feedback. Emotional memory biases, in turn, predicted decreases in women’s self-enhancing, math valuing and performance. Findings provide an emotional memory encoding-based mechanism for well-established findings indicating that women have more negative math self-perceptions compared with men regardless of actual performance.

The role of startle fluctuation and non-response startle reflex in tracking amygdala dynamics

“…For instance, Forbes et al (2018) exposed men and women to a manipulation that made the situation particularly stressful for women and rendered negative (compared to positive) feedback received in these contexts as threatening. When below threshold startle trials were excluded, and several subjects were excluded for not having sufficient numbers of above threshold startle trials, analyses revealed a linear relationship indicating that all subjects elicited larger startle responses to negative feedback, and women elicited larger startle responses in general compared to men.…”

Context matters: Situational stress impedes functional reorganization of intrinsic brain connectivity during problem solving

“…In the control condition, participants were told that the results of the following tasks would be diagnostic of the types of problem-solving techniques they prefer (Forbes and Leitner 2014;Forbes et al 2015). To further prime stereotype-based stress in the stress condition, participants marked their gender, sessions had a male experimenter present, and all instructions were read via a male experimenter's voice (following protocol of Forbes et al, 2018). Conversely, participants in the control condition did not mark their gender, all sessions had all female experimenters present, and all instructions were read via a female experimenter's voice.…”

“…One way to randomly select from a sample of cognitively normal individuals, ensure all individuals are exposed to the same stimuli, but place only one group uniquely in a stressful context is to prime stereotypebased stress (SBS) in women. SBS is a robust situational stressor that individuals experience as a result of primed context cues suggesting they may be negatively evaluated based on their membership in a stigmatized group, not unlike studies on social evaluative threat that utilize the common Trier Social Stress Test (Schmader et al 2008;Hall et al 2015;Forbes et al 2018;Kirschbaum, Pirke, & Hellhammer, 1993;Allen et al 2014). Consequently, this form of evaluative threat initiates a persistent cycle of hypervigilance and attempts to regulate accompanying emotions, both of which have been shown to interfere with cognitive capacity that is otherwise needed for optimal performance on cognitively intensive tasks (Schmader et al 2008).…”

How the brain negotiates divergent executive processing demands: Evidence of network reorganization during fleeting brain states

“…Participants completed a 34-minute math task identical to Forbes, Amey, Magerman, Duran, & Liu (2018). The task consisted of standard multiplication and division problems (e.g.…”

“…Initial analyses on amygdala activity (assessed via startle probes elicited to positive and negative feedback and operationalized as a measure of stress) were conducted inForbes et al (2018). These analyses indicated that all participants elicited marginally greater amygdala responses to negative feedback received on the math feedback task compared to positive feedback and women elicited larger amygdala responses to feedback compared to men.…”