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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Dec 13, 2025

Measuring Attentional Biases for Threat in Children and Adults

Measuring Attentional Biases for Threat in Children and Adults

Published on: October 19, 2014

How does the attention system learn from aversive outcomes?

Haena Kim¹, Brian A Anderson¹

¹Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences.

Emotion (Washington, D.C.)

|July 29, 2020

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Classical conditioning, not avoidance learning, primarily directs attention toward aversive stimuli predictors. This suggests attention is guided by motivational relevance, not just emotional valence.

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Last Updated: Dec 13, 2025

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Area of Science:

Cognitive Psychology
Neuroscience
Learning and Memory

Background:

Attention is guided by learning about aversive outcomes.
Classical conditioning biases attention to aversive predictors.
Instrumental learning supports avoidance behavior, complicating attention dissociation.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the distinct roles of classical and instrumental learning in attention control.
To determine which learning process, classical conditioning or avoidance behavior, more strongly influences attention to aversive stimuli.

Main Methods:

Participants learned to avoid electric shock by making saccades away from a stimulus.
The study measured orientation bias towards stimuli associated with aversive outcomes.
Behavioral responses were analyzed to infer the underlying learning mechanisms.

Main Results:

Despite training to avoid the shock-associated stimulus, participants showed a bias to orient towards it.
This orienting bias indicates a dominant role for classical conditioning in attention.
The findings suggest classical conditioning overrides instrumental avoidance learning in directing attention.

Conclusions:

Classical conditioning exerts a stronger influence on attention than instrumental avoidance learning.
Attention appears to be guided by motivational salience, irrespective of emotional valence.
This highlights the fundamental role of associative learning in attentional processes.