The role of fear and expectancies in capture of covert attention by spiders.

Devue, Christel; Belopolsky, Artem V.; Theeuwes, Jan

doi:10.1037/a0023418

Cited by 37 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…This result supports our hypothesis and indicates to what extent uncertainty and uncontrollability may alter the attentional bias in phobic individuals probably by increasing anxiety-related levels. This statement is partly in line with one study in which uncertainty (not sure where a spider is going to be present) enhanced attentional scrutiny for both threatening and neutral/irrelevant stimuli in phobic individuals [28]. That is, uncertainty led to generalized hypervigilance when phobics were not able to predict the appearance of threats.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

Different Patterns of Attentional Bias in Subjects with Spider Phobia: A Dot Probe Task using Virtual Reality Environment

Frías¹

2015

Arch Depress Anxiety

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Background: Cognitive theories posit that small animal phobics develop a hypervigilanceavoidance attentional pattern when coping with threat. However, empirical research has failed to obtain consistent results. We aimed at addressing this issue by diminishing the methodological flaws that hinder the internal and ecological validity of previous studies. Methods:In this research, 34 spider fearful and 33 non-fearful participants completed a probe dot task using virtual reality environments. A subjective threshold for each participant was established. Position of the probe (low vs. up) and interval between trials (regular vs. irregular) were controlled.Results: Compared to non-fearful individuals, spider phobics showed preconscious attentional bias towards threat in unexpected (low and irregular) trials. Moreover, phobics tended to display conscious attentional bias away from threat in unexpected (irregular) trials. Severity of fear did not correlate with attentional bias. Limitations:We did not use eye movement tracking as well as potential biomarkers for attentional bias (e.g., event-related potentials). The risk of type-I error cannot be ruled out. Conclusions:These findings partly support the hyper vigilance-avoidance pattern by considering some contextual factors that may enhance uncertainty in phobics. The alleged role of attentional bias in phobias is also questioned.(conscious) processing [7,14]. This methodological flaw precludes the determination of subjective threshold for each subject by assuming a generalized (objective) awareness threshold for the whole sample. Furthermore, the ecological validity of these studies is still inadequate, and most of them employ threatening pictures to assess phobia to spider rather than more realistic environments [5,7,15]. In this framework, virtual reality may be considered an alternative approach to enhancing the ecological validity from these studies by using more realistic, immersive, and interactive scenarios. To date, virtual reality has been mainly adapted to treat individuals diagnosed with different mental disorders such as anxiety disorders or eating disorders [16][17][18]. However, its application in basic cognitive research is lacking. Aims and hypothesesBased on previous research, our study aimed at elucidating the time course of emotional processing of threat in individuals with spider phobia by increasing the internal and ecological validity of the results obtained. We hypothesized that phobic individuals, relative to nonphobic controls, will display a preconscious attentional bias towards threatening stimuli as well as a conscious attentional bias away from threatening stimuli. In addition, we postulate that this result will be altered by the degree of uncertainty and uncontrollability concerning the appearance and position of the threatening stimuli. That is, phobic individuals will exhibit enhanced preconscious attentional bias towards as well as increased conscious attentional bias away

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

Different Patterns of Attentional Bias in Subjects with Spider Phobia: A Dot Probe Task using Virtual Reality Environment

Frías¹

2015

Arch Depress Anxiety

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“…emotional Stroop tasks; Williams, Matthews, & MacLeod, 1996, and in visual search with emotional distractors; Devue, Bepolsky, & Theeuwes, 2011). Our findings therefore require replication using a mixed presentation format, to determine whether similarly effective control is possible when participants cannot predict the nature of an upcoming distractor.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 83%

Contrasting reactive and proactive control of emotional distraction.

Grimshaw¹,

Kranz²,

Carmel³

et al. 2018

Emotion

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Attending to emotional stimuli is often beneficial, because they provide important social and environmental cues. Sometimes, however, current goals require that we ignore them.To what extent can we control emotional distraction? Here we show that the ability to ignore emotional distractions depends on the type of cognitive control that is engaged.Participants completed a simple perceptual task at fixation while irrelevant images appeared peripherally. In two experiments, we manipulated the proportion of trials in which images appeared, in order to encourage use of either reactive control (rare distractors) or proactive control (frequent distractors). Under reactive control, both negative and positive images were more distracting than neutral images, even though they were irrelevant and appeared in unattended locations. However, under proactive control, distraction by both emotional and neutral images was eliminated. Contrasting Reactive and Proactive Control of Emotional DistractionEmotional stimuli are important. They signal potential threats and rewards and so guide adaptive behaviour. Perceptual and attentional systems prioritize them, as demonstrated through behavioural, electrophysiological and neuroimaging research (for reviews see Carretié, 2014;Okon-Singer, Lichtenstein-Vidne, & Cohen, 2013;Pourtois, Schettino, & Vuilleumier, 2013;Yiend, 2010). But sometimes we need to ignore an emotional stimulus so we can get on with the task at hand. We might need to block out a scowling face to maintain our goal of giving a good talk, or ignore an attractive classmate to concentrate on a lecture. Emotional distractions plague us all, and in disorders such as depression, anxiety, and addiction, they can be overwhelming (Cisler & Koster, 2010;De Raedt & Koster, 2010;Field & Cox, 2008). Non-emotional distractors are known to disrupt performance (Forster & Lavie, 2008a,2008b, but they can also be controlled if we know to expect them (Braver, 2012;Müller, Geyer, Zehetleitner & Krummenacher, 2009) Can we ever control emotional distractions as effectively as those that are more mundane? Cognitive Control of Non-emotional DistractionIn non-emotional contexts, entirely irrelevant stimuli can disrupt performance (Forster & Lavie, 2008a, 2008b. For example, Forster and Lavie (2008a) describe an irrelevant flanker paradigm in which participants complete a letter discrimination task near fixation, while irrelevant images (cartoon characters) appear peripherally. Even when the images are completely task-irrelevant and appear in non-target locations, they can disrupt performance (Forster & Lavie, 2008a as long as the participant's task is perceptually simple (i.e., low load; Forster & Lavie, 2008b). Even under low load, distraction is not obligatory, though; distractors are also less disruptive when they appear more frequently. In 4 Forster and Lavie's (2008a) experiment, images were significantly less distracting when they appeared on 50% compared to 10% of trials. Even more striking distractor frequency effects can be se...

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“…Previous studies may seem to suggest that threat stimuli are prioritized for attention (over neutral stimuli) regardless of their relevance to the current task goal (Lipp & Waters, 2007;Mogg & Bradley, 1998). For example, goal-relevant threat targets (snakes) are detected more rapidly than neutral targets (frogs and flowers) in visual search tasks (LoBue & DeLoache, 2008, and goal-irrelevant threat distractors (snakes, spiders) also slow target responses relative to neutral distractors (e.g., butterflies and leaves, Devue, Belopolsky and Theeuwes, 2011;lizards and cockroaches, Lipp & Waters, 2007). Furthermore, studies using the dot-probe task have demonstrated that goal-irrelevant threat distractors that preceded a neutral target (irrelevant cue), speed responses when the threat distractor and target are presented in the same location and slow responses when presented in a different location (Koster, Crombez, & Verschuere, & De Houwer, 2004).…”

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confidence: 99%

Threat captures attention, but not automatically: Top-down goals modulate attentional orienting to threat distractors

Vromen

Lipp

Remington

et al. 2016

Atten Percept Psychophys

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The rapid orienting of attention to potential threats has been proposed to proceed outside of top-down control. However, paradigms that have been used to investigate this have struggled to separate the rapid orienting of attention (i.e. capture) from the later disengagement of focal attention that may be subject to top-down control. Consequently, it remains unclear whether and to what extent orienting to threat is contingent on top-down goals. The current study manipulated the goal-relevance of threat distractors (spiders), whilst a strict top-down attentional set was encouraged by presenting the saliently colored target and the threat distracter simultaneously for a limited time. The goal-relevance of threatening distractors was manipulated by including a spider amongst the possible target stimuli (Experiment 1: spider/cat targets) or excluding it (Experiment 2: bird/fish targets). Orienting and disengagement were disentangled by cueing attention away from or towards the threat prior to its onset. The results indicated that the threatening spider distractors elicited rapid orienting of attention when spiders were potentially goalrelevant (Experiment 1) but did so much less when they were irrelevant to the task goal (Experiment 2). Delayed disengagement from the threat distractors was even more strongly contingent on the task goal and occurred only when a spider was a possible target. These results highlight the role of top-down goals in attentional orienting to and disengagement from threat.

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The role of fear and expectancies in capture of covert attention by spiders.

Cited by 37 publications

References 39 publications

Different Patterns of Attentional Bias in Subjects with Spider Phobia: A Dot Probe Task using Virtual Reality Environment

Different Patterns of Attentional Bias in Subjects with Spider Phobia: A Dot Probe Task using Virtual Reality Environment

Contrasting reactive and proactive control of emotional distraction.

Threat captures attention, but not automatically: Top-down goals modulate attentional orienting to threat distractors

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