Arousal and cognition: word arousal and visual search

The influence of target-word affective properties on information processing time in a high speed visual-search task was studied. The 24 words were embedded in random-letter matrices, with one word per matrix. Subjects (5 male, 5 female) were tested. Words extreme on emotionality (positive vs negative affect) yielded significantly longer latencies than neutral words. The results were discussed in the light of related list-learning and problem-solving research.