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Attentional demand induced by visual crowding modulates the anger superiority effect.
1School of Psychology, Jiangxi Normal University, Nanchang, 330022, People's Republic of China. gongmliang@gmail.com.
Attention, Perception & Psychophysics
|January 11, 2022
Summary
The anger superiority effect (ASE) in face perception is modulated by attentional demands. This study found that the ASE, the faster detection of angry faces, only appears under high attention, supporting the attentional demands modulation hypothesis.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Visual Perception
- Neuroscience
Background:
- Inconsistent findings exist regarding emotional bias in face perception, with some studies suggesting angry faces are detected faster (anger superiority effect, ASE), while others do not.
- A recent study proposed that attentional demands modulate the ASE, with the effect vanishing under low attentional demand.
Purpose of the Study:
- To test the attentional demands modulation hypothesis.
- To investigate how attentional demands influence the anger superiority effect (ASE) in face perception.
Main Methods:
- A visual crowding task was employed, requiring participants to identify target faces as happy or angry.
- Attentional demands were manipulated by varying stimulus configuration, target-flanker separation, and stimulus eccentricity across two experiments.
Main Results:
- Experiment 1 demonstrated an ASE under high attentional demand, which diminished and disappeared as attentional demand decreased.
- Experiment 2 replicated these findings, showing a reduction in ASE with increased target-flanker separation.
Conclusions:
- The emergence and magnitude of the anger superiority effect are significantly modulated by attentional demands.
- These findings provide strong support for the attentional demands modulation hypothesis in explaining emotional biases in face perception.
