Effects of affective content and motivational context on neural gain functions during naturalistic scene perception

Visual scene processing is modulated by semantic, motivational, and emotional factors, in addition to physical scene statistics. An open question is to what extent those factors affect low-level visual processing. One index of low-level visual processing is the contrast response function (CRF), representing the change in neural or psychophysical gain with increasing stimulus contrast. Here we aimed to (a) establish the use of an electrophysiological technique for assessing CRFs with complex emotional scenes and (b) examine the effects of motivational context and emotional content on CRFs elicited by naturalistic stimuli, including faces and complex scenes (humans, animals). Motivational context varied by expectancy of threat (a noxious noise) versus safety. CRFs were measured in 18 participants by means of sweep steady-state visual evoked potentials. Results showed a facilitation in visuocortical sensitivity (contrast gain) under threat, compared with safe conditions, across all stimulus categories. Facial stimuli prompted heightened neural response gain, compared with scenes. Within the scenes, response gain was smaller for scenes high in emotional arousal, compared with low-arousing scenes, consistent with interference effects of emotional content. These findings support the notion that motivational context alters the contrast sensitivity of cortical tissue, differing from changes in response gain (activation) when visual cues themselves carry motivational/affective relevance.