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Published on: October 19, 2014
Enhanced attentional capture in trait anxiety
Jason S Moser1, Mark W Becker, Tim P Moran
1Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA. jmoser@msu.edu
Emotion (Washington, D.C.)
|November 9, 2011
Summary
High trait anxiety, not worry, increases attentional distraction by salient stimuli. This suggests anxiety enhances bottom-up processing for detecting motivational significance.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Neuroscience
- Psychopathology
Background:
- Attentional Control Theory posits anxiety distracts attention with salient stimuli.
- Worry is a proposed mechanism linking anxiety and attentional impairment.
- Direct evidence for these links remains limited.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the relationship between trait anxiety, worry, and attentional distraction.
- To examine distraction by salient, task-irrelevant stimuli in a visual search task.
Main Methods:
- Assessed trait anxiety and worry levels.
- Utilized a visual search task with a salient color singleton.
- Measured attentional capture by the singleton.
Main Results:
- Trait anxiety correlated with increased attentional distraction (capture) by the color singleton.
- Worry was not significantly related to attentional distraction.
- Results indicate anxiety enhances bottom-up motivational significance detection.
Conclusions:
- Trait anxiety, rather than worry, is linked to attentional capture by salient stimuli.
- Anxiety may broadly enhance sensory processing for motivationally relevant cues.
- Findings support ACT's focus on anxiety's impact on attentional control.
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