Filtern
Volltext vorhanden
- ja (37)
Gehört zur Bibliographie
- ja (37)
Erscheinungsjahr
- 2016 (37) (entfernen)
Dokumenttyp
- Artikel / Aufsatz in einer Zeitschrift (27)
- Dissertation (9)
- Buch (1)
Schlagworte
- event-related potentials (4)
- EEG (2)
- Electroencephalographie (2)
- Humans (2)
- Kognition (2)
- Metakognition (2)
- Motivation (2)
- P300 (2)
- attention (2)
- electroencephalography (2)
- fear (2)
- perception (2)
- virtual reality (2)
- virtuelle Realität (2)
- ADHS (1)
- Adult (1)
- Affective processing (1)
- Affekt (1)
- Agoraphobia (1)
- Akzeptanz (1)
- Alpha-Aktivität (1)
- Amygdala (1)
- Animal models (1)
- Anxiety (1)
- Anxiety sensitivity (1)
- Aufmerksamkeitsdefizit-Syndrom (1)
- Aversive events (1)
- Avoidance behavior (1)
- Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (1)
- Blickbewegung (1)
- Brain Computer Interface (1)
- Broca (1)
- Case-Control Studies (1)
- Cognitive Distortions (1)
- Cognitive Therapy (1)
- Conditioning evidence (1)
- Contextual fear (1)
- DNA (1)
- DNA Methylation (1)
- Doppelaufgabe (1)
- Dual task (1)
- Early posterior negativity (1)
- Effektivität (1)
- Electroencephalography (1)
- Elektroencephalogramm (1)
- Elektrofahrzeug (1)
- Embodiment (1)
- Emotion (1)
- Emotional expression (1)
- Emotionsregulation (1)
- Emotionsverarbeitung (1)
- Empathie (1)
- Energieeinsparung (1)
- Entwicklung (1)
- Entwicklungspsychologie (1)
- Epigenesis (1)
- Ereigniskorreliertes Potential (1)
- Erwachsener (1)
- Event-related potential (1)
- Expositionstherapie (1)
- Eye gaze (1)
- Faces and scenes (1)
- Fahrsimulator (1)
- Female (1)
- Frontal asymmetry (1)
- Funktionelle Kernspintomografie (1)
- Gambler's Fallacy (1)
- Gaze perception (1)
- Gefühl (1)
- Genetic (1)
- Glücksspiel (1)
- Heart Period (1)
- Hot Hand Fallacy (1)
- Information Integration Theory (1)
- Judgments of Learning (1)
- Jugend (1)
- Kennlinie (1)
- Kindheit (1)
- Kognitiver Prozess (1)
- Kohlberg (1)
- Lebenslauf (1)
- Leistungsmotivation (1)
- Lernerfolg (1)
- Längsschnittuntersuchung (1)
- Manual responses (1)
- Mathematics Achievement (1)
- Mathematikleistung (1)
- Mathematikunterricht (1)
- Mehrfachtätigkeit (1)
- Metacognitive Knowledge (1)
- Metakognitives Wissen (1)
- Monoamine Oxidase/genetics (1)
- Multitasking (1)
- N100 (1)
- N170 (1)
- Near Miss (1)
- Openfield test (1)
- P300 speller (1)
- Panic Disorder/genetics (1)
- Panic Disorder/therapy (1)
- Personality (1)
- Perspektivenübernahme (1)
- Phobie (1)
- Problem Gambling (1)
- Prof. Dr. Paul Pauli (1)
- Psychobiologie (1)
- Reaktionszeit (1)
- Saccades (1)
- Schmerzmodulation (1)
- Schmerzreiz (1)
- Sekundarstufe (1)
- Selective attention (1)
- Sequence Analysis (1)
- Social anxiety (1)
- Spielsucht (1)
- Spontaneous facial EMG (1)
- Sustained attention (1)
- Task interference (1)
- Theory of Mind (1)
- Thigmotaxis (1)
- Time-course (1)
- VBM (1)
- Vigilance (1)
- Virtual-reality (1)
- Vocal responses (1)
- acceptance (1)
- achievement motivation (1)
- active accelerator pedal (1)
- adult ADHD (1)
- adversity (1)
- allostatic load (1)
- analysis of variance (1)
- anchoring (1)
- anticipation (1)
- anticipatory planning (1)
- aphasia (1)
- approach (1)
- arousal (1)
- assistive technology (1)
- attentional bias (1)
- audio stimulus (1)
- auditory (1)
- auditory stimulation (1)
- behavior (1)
- bilateral BAS model (1)
- body mass index (1)
- brain computer interface (1)
- brain response (1)
- brain-computer interface (1)
- brain-computer interface (BCI) (1)
- calorie content (1)
- cardiorespiratory disease (1)
- child development (1)
- childhood maltreatment (1)
- co-adaptive (1)
- cognition development (1)
- cross-modal action (1)
- decision making (1)
- development (1)
- developmental disorders (1)
- dot probe (1)
- dyspnea (1)
- early literacy (1)
- eco mode (1)
- eco-driving (1)
- efficiency (1)
- electric vehicle (1)
- emotion (1)
- emotion processing (1)
- emotion regulation (1)
- emotional design (1)
- emotions (1)
- end-state comfort effect (1)
- energy density (1)
- expectation (1)
- experience (1)
- experimental design (1)
- eye movements (1)
- fMRI (1)
- fear conditioning (1)
- fear generalization (1)
- fingers (1)
- food-cues (1)
- fully automatic (1)
- gaze independence (1)
- hands (1)
- happiness (1)
- hazard perception (1)
- heuristics and biases (1)
- immersion (1)
- impulsivity (1)
- infant faces (1)
- judgment (1)
- large-scale assessment (1)
- learning outcomes (1)
- locked-in syndrome (1)
- machine leaning (1)
- maternal behavior (1)
- maturation (1)
- minimally conscious state (1)
- mismatch (1)
- moral judgment (1)
- motor development (1)
- music background (1)
- musical training (1)
- nocebo hyperalgesia (1)
- oxytocin (1)
- peripheral vision (1)
- phobische Stimuli (1)
- phonological awareness (1)
- phonological training (1)
- placebo hypoalgesia (1)
- polarity effects (1)
- positive and negative affect (1)
- preprocessing (1)
- preschool children (1)
- presence (1)
- prospective study (1)
- psychological placebo intervention (1)
- regenerative braking (1)
- reinforcement sensitivity theory (1)
- replication (1)
- retro-cue (1)
- selective accessibility (1)
- sensory perception (1)
- skin conductance (1)
- specific phobia (1)
- stressful life events (1)
- stroke rehabilitation (1)
- testosterone (1)
- traffic (1)
- training (1)
- ultimatum game (1)
- unresponsive wakefulness syndrome (1)
- usability (1)
- user-centered design (1)
- valence (1)
- vegetative state (1)
- virtual reality T-maze (1)
- vision (1)
- visual orientation (1)
- visual working memory (1)
- weight gain (1)
- withdrawal (1)
- words (1)
Institut
- Institut für Psychologie (37) (entfernen)
Sonstige beteiligte Institutionen
EU-Projektnummer / Contract (GA) number
- 20100407 (1)
- 639445 (1)
- ERC-2013-StG-336305 (1)
„Perspective-taking“ is the ability to put yourself into the place of somebody else. Psychological research distinguishes three kinds of perspective-taking, namely, perceptual (visuo-spatial), affective (empathy), and cognitive (theory of mind) perspective-taking. The last two kinds of perspective-taking are often summarized as “psychological perspective-taking”. This dissertation tackles the question of whether these three kinds of perspective-taking should be conceptualized as independent constructs or as facets of one and the same construct.
Prior research findings concerning this are equivocal. While some authors consider correlations between the different kinds of perspective-taking as too low for a unitary construct, others interpret correlations of the same magnitude as evidence for this. A less arbitrary way of deciding this would be to identify common mechanisms that underlie all kinds of perspective-taking and to examine whether manipulating these mechanisms in psychological experiments affects measures of perceptual, affective, and cognitive perspective-taking in parallel.
In accordance with this reasoning, the present dissertation assumes that the mental self-rotation of the body schema into the physical location of another person, the main mechanism of perceptual perspective-taking, is a common mechanism of all kinds of perspective-taking. Thus, contrary to previous research a unitary construct is not only justified on the grounds of a common central functionality of all kinds of perspective-taking, that is, overcoming one’s egocentrism in favor of an alternative (perceptual, affective or cognitive) point of view, but additionally on the grounds of a common psychological mechanism. From this, the simple hypothesis that inducing visuo-spatial perspective-taking also leads to psychological consequences is derived. This hypothesis was tested in 6 experiments.
In these experiments, participants first had to adopt the visual perspective of another person. To this end, they saw a person sitting at a table with two objects. During every trial, participants had to decide which hand the person would have to use in order to grab one of the two objects. Furthermore, the angular disparity between the participant and the target was manipulated in such a way that during half of the trials the target person was within the same visuo-spatial reference frame as the participant and thus no perspective-taking was necessary to solve the task correctly. During the remaining trials, the target person was sitting in another visuo-spatial reference frame so that the participants had to engage in perspective-taking to solve the task correctly. After every such trial, the target person was imbued with a mental state. This was done using an adapted paradigm for the investigation of the anchoring heuristic. Specifically, participants were asked to answer a trivia question and also saw what the target person from the visuo-spatial perspective-taking task was guessing.
In line with the hypothesis that visuo-spatial perspective-taking leads to psychological outcomes, too, it was found that participants adopted the thoughts of the target person more strongly after visuo-spatial perspective-taking. This was evident in the absolute size of the anchoring effect, as well as the differences between participant and target estimations. Further experiments ruled out sample and stimulus characteristics and task difficulty as alternative explanations for these effects. The last two experiments furthermore established that the effects were specific to constellations where an embodied self-rotation into the target’s perspective was necessary and that the adoption of the target’s thoughts was associated with feelings of similarity.
Taken together, these findings support the theoretically elaborated unitary view of perspective-taking and furthermore distinguish this construct from other related phenomena. In the general discussion, the significance of these findings for research on empathy, theory of mind, and perspective-taking, as well as practical implications are discussed.
BACKGROUND:
Thigmotaxis refers to a specific behavior of animals (i.e., to stay close to walls when exploring an open space). Such behavior can be assessed with the open field test (OFT), which is a well-established indicator of animal fear. The detection of similar open field behavior in humans may verify the translational validity of this paradigm. Enhanced thigmotaxis related to anxiety may suggest the relevance of such behavior for anxiety disorders, especially agoraphobia.
METHODS:
A global positioning system was used to analyze the behavior of 16 patients with agoraphobia and 18 healthy individuals with a risk for agoraphobia (i.e., high anxiety sensitivity) during a human OFT and compare it with appropriate control groups (n = 16 and n = 19). We also tracked 17 patients with agoraphobia and 17 control participants during a city walk that involved walking through an open market square. RESULTS: Our human OFT triggered thigmotaxis in participants; patients with agoraphobia and participants with high anxiety sensitivity exhibited enhanced thigmotaxis. This behavior was evident in increased movement lengths along the wall of the natural open field and fewer entries into the center of the field despite normal movement speed and length. Furthermore, participants avoided passing through the market square during the city walk, indicating again that thigmotaxis is related to agoraphobia.
CONCLUSIONS:
This study is the first to our knowledge to verify the translational validity of the OFT and to reveal that thigmotaxis, an evolutionarily adaptive behavior shown by most species, is related to agoraphobia, a pathologic fear of open spaces, and anxiety sensitivity, a risk factor for agoraphobia.
Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is characterized by symptoms of inattentiveness and hyperactivity/impulsivity. Besides, increasing evidence points to ADHD patients showing emotional dysfunctions and concomitant problems in social life. However, systematic research on emotional dysfunctions in ADHD is still rare, and to date most studies lack conceptual differentiation between emotion processing and emotion regulation. The aim of this thesis was to systematically investigate emotion processing and emotion regulation in adult ADHD in a virtual reality paradigm implementing social interaction. Emotional reactions were assessed on experiential, physiological, and behavioral levels.
Experiment 1 was conducted to develop a virtual penalty kicking paradigm implying social feedback and to test it in a healthy sample. This paradigm should then be applied in ADHD patients later on. Pleasant and unpleasant trials in this paradigm consisted of hits respectively misses and subsequent feedback from a virtual coach. In neutral trials, participants were teleported to different spots of the virtual stadium. Results indicated increased positive affectivity (higher valence and arousal ratings, higher zygomaticus activations, and higher expression rates of positive emotional behavior) in response to pleasant compared to neutral trials. Reactions to unpleasant trials were contradictory, indicating increased levels of both positive and negative affectivity, compared to neutral trials. Unpleasant vs. neutral trials revealed lower valence ratings, higher arousal ratings, higher zygomaticus activations, slightly lower corrugator activations, and higher expression rates of both positive and negative emotional behavior. The intensity of emotional reactions correlated with experienced presence in the virtual reality.
To better understand the impact of hits or misses per se vs. hits or misses with coach feedback healthy participants’ emotional reactions, only 50% of all shots were followed by coach feedback in experiment 2. Neutral trials consisted of shots over the free soccer field which were followed by coach feedback in 50 % of all trials. Shots and feedback evoked more extreme valence and arousal ratings, higher zygomaticus activations, lower corrugator activations, and higher skin conductance responses than shots alone across emotional conditions. Again, results speak for the induction of positive emotions in pleasant trials whereas the induction of negative emotions in unpleasant trials seems ambiguous. Technical improvements of the virtual reality were reflected in higher presence ratings than in experiment 1.
Experiment 3 investigated emotional reactions of adult ADHD patients and healthy controls after emotion processing and response-focused emotion regulation. Participants successively
went through an ostensible online ball-tossing game (cyber ball) inducing negative emotions, and an adapted version of the virtual penalty kicking game. Throughout cyber ball, participants were included or ostracized by two other players in different experimental blocks. Participants were instructed to explicitly show, not regulate, or hide their emotions in different experimental blocks. Results provided some evidence for deficient processing of positive emotions in ADHD. Patients reported slightly lower positive affect than controls during cyber ball, gave lower valence ratings than controls in response to pleasant penalty kicking trials, and showed lower zygomaticus activations than controls especially during penalty kicking. Patients in comparison with controls showed slightly increased processing of unpleasant events during cyber ball (higher ratings of negative affect, especially in response to ostracism), but not during penalty kicking. Patients showed lower baseline skin conductance levels than controls, and impaired skin conductance modulations. Compared to controls, patients showed slight over-expression of positive as well as negative emotional behavior. Emotion regulation analyses revealed no major difficulties of ADHD vs. controls in altering their emotional reactions through deliberate response modulation. Moreover, patients reported to habitually apply adaptive emotion regulation strategies even more frequently than controls. The analyses of genetic high-risk vs. low-risk groups for ADHD across the whole sample revealed similar results as analyses for patients vs. controls for zygomaticus modulations during emotion processing, and for modulations of emotional reactions due to emotion regulation.
To sum up, the virtual penalty kicking paradigm proved to be successful for the induction of positive, but not negative emotions. The importance of presence in virtual reality for the intensity of induced emotions could be replicated. ADHD patients showed impaired processing of primarily positive emotions. Aberrations in negative emotional responding were less clear and need further investigation. Results point to adult ADHD in comparison to healthy controls suffering from baseline deficits in autonomic arousal and deficits in arousal modulation. Deficits of ADHD in the deliberate application of response-focused emotion regulation could not be found.
Die begrenzte Reichweite ist einer der Hauptgründe für das derzeitige mangelnde Kaufinteresse an Elektrofahrzeugen. Neben rein komponentenoptimierenden Maßnahmen, wie der Verbesserung der Batterie, ist die Förderung von Eco-Driving, also einer energieeffizienten Fahrweise, ein effektiver Ansatz zur Steigerung der Reichweite. Trainings und visuell dargebotene Eco-Assistenten können Eco-Driving wirksam steigern, schöpfen aber nicht dessen gesamtes Potential aus. Angepasste Pedal- und Motorkennlinien könnten Eco-Driving zusätzlich fördern. Für deren Bewertung sind die Wirksamkeit und Akzeptanz bisher nicht gemeinsam berücksichtig worden oder sie wurden nicht im Elektrofahrzeug evaluiert und validiert. Zu diesen Anpassungen zählen eine Veränderung des Beschleunigungspedals, sodass mit diesem gleichzeitig beschleunigt und rekuperiert werden kann, die Limitierung von Drehmoment und Leistung und der Einsatz eines aktiven Beschleunigungspedals, welches Widerstände abhängig von Fahrzeug- oder Situationsparametern aktiviert.
Für diese Arbeit habe ich daher die Pedal- und Motorkennlinien entsprechend angepasst und in ein validiertes Elektroautomodell implementiert. Ziel war es, verschiedene Fahrverhaltensbereiche im Elektrofahrzeug, die Eco-Driving kennzeichnen (energieoptimales Beschleunigen und Verzögern, Einhalten von Geschwindigkeitsbegrenzungen, vorausschauendes Fahren), benutzerfreundlich, akzeptabel und wirksam zu unterstützen. Zu diesem Zweck habe ich vier Probandenstudien im bewegten Fahrsimulator durchgeführt und geeignete Pedal- und Motorkennlinien empirisch bestimmt. In der ersten Studie habe ich untersucht, ob und warum eine Pedalkennlinie zu bevorzugen ist, bei der mit dem Beschleunigungspedal anstelle des Bremspedals rekuperiert wird. Das Ziel der zweiten Studie war es, eine geeignete Rekuperationsstärke für ein kombiniertes Beschleunigungspedal, bei dem mit dem Beschleunigungspedal rekuperiert wird, zu bestimmen. In der dritten Studie habe ich evaluiert, ob die Limitierung der Leistung oder die des Drehmoments zu bevorzugen ist, um das Beschleunigungsverhalten zu optimieren und wie stark die Limitierungen optimaler Weise sein sollten. Basierend auf den Ergebnissen der dritten Studie, habe ich schließlich einen optimierten Limitierungsansatz konzipiert, diesen mit einem aktiven Beschleunigungspedal verglichen und bestimmt, welcher Ansatz zu bevorzugen ist.
Aufgrund der Studienergebnisse werden folgende Ansätze für die jeweiligen Eco-Driving-Fahrverhaltensbereiche empfohlen und es werden folgende Gestaltungsempfehlungen abgeleitet: Zur Förderung eines energieeffizienten Beschleunigungsverhaltens ist die Limitierung von Drehmoment und Leistung geeignet. Die Limitierung des Drehmoments ist hierbei besonders wirksam in geringen, die Limitierung der maximalen Leistung in höheren Geschwindigkeitsbereichen. Zu empfehlen sind parallele mittelstarke Limitierungen von maximalem Drehmoment und maximaler Leistung, die Beschleunigungen mit 2.0 m/s² erlauben, bei gleichzeitiger Bereitstellung eines Kick-Downs. Ein aktives Beschleunigungspedal ist insbesondere aus Gründen der Benutzerfreundlichkeit zur Förderung eines energieeffizienten Beschleunigungsverhaltens nur eingeschränkt empfehlenswert.
Zur Förderung eines energieeffizienten Verzögerungsverhaltens wird die Implementierung der Rekuperationsfunktion auf dem Beschleunigungspedal anstelle des Bremspedals empfohlen, da dies einerseits ermöglicht, auf hydraulisches Bremsen zu verzichten und gleichzeitig mehr Energie rekuperiert werden kann. Ersteres trägt zu einer hohen Akzeptanz bei, letzteres zu einer günstigen Energiebilanz. Besonders effektiv und akzeptabel ist ein kombiniertes Fahrbremspedal, wenn es eine starke Rekuperation ermöglicht (zwischen -1.7 und -2.1 m/s²). Weiterhin ist ein aktives Beschleunigungspedal, das den geeigneten Zeitpunkt für eine maximal energieeffiziente Verzögerung mit einem kombinierten Fahrbremspedal anzeigt, wirksam, um die rekuperierte Energie zu steigern. Auf diese Weise kann zudem eine vorausschauende Fahrweise unterstützt werden. Hierbei muss jedoch die Funktionalität und Benutzerfreundlichkeit optimiert werden, um eine gesteigerte kognitive Fahrerbeanspruchung und Minderungen der Akzeptanz zu vermeiden. Zur Unterstützung der Einhaltung von Geschwindigkeitsbegrenzungen ist ebenfalls das aktive Beschleunigungspedal geeignet. Der Fahrer sollte hierbei aber die Möglichkeit haben, individuell Grenzwerte einzustellen.
Die Verknüpfung eines kombinierten Fahrbremspedals mit einer Limitierung von Drehmoment und Leistung sowie einem aktiven Beschleunigungspedal kann abschließend, unter Berücksichtigung der abgeleiteten Gestaltungsempfehlungen, als effektive und akzeptable Möglichkeit zur Förderung unterschiedlicher Verhaltensbereiche von Eco-Driving bewertet werden. Die erwarteten Synergieeffekte der evaluierten Ansätze in Verbindung mit Eco-Trainings und visuell dargebotenen Eco-Feedback-Assistenten sowie deren Langfristigkeit sollten Gegenstand weiterführender Forschung sein.
Gaze-independent brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) are a possible communication channel for persons with paralysis. We investigated if it is possible to use auditory stimuli to create a BCI for the Japanese Hiragana syllabary, which has 46 Hiragana characters. Additionally, we investigated if training has an effect on accuracy despite the high amount of different stimuli involved. Able-bodied participants (N = 6) were asked to select 25 syllables (out of fifty possible choices) using a two step procedure: First the consonant (ten choices) and then the vowel (five choices). This was repeated on 3 separate days. Additionally, a person with spinal cord injury (SCI) participated in the experiment. Four out of six healthy participants reached Hiragana syllable accuracies above 70% and the information transfer rate increased from 1.7 bits/min in the first session to 3.2 bits/min in the third session. The accuracy of the participant with SCI increased from 12% (0.2 bits/min) to 56% (2 bits/min) in session three. Reliable selections from a 10 × 5 matrix using auditory stimuli were possible and performance is increased by training. We were able to show that auditory P300 BCIs can be used for communication with up to fifty symbols. This enables the use of the technology of auditory P300 BCIs with a variety of applications.
The affective dimensions of emotional valence and emotional arousal affect processing of verbal and pictorial stimuli. Traditional emotional theories assume a linear relationship between these dimensions, with valence determining the direction of a behavior (approach vs. withdrawal) and arousal its intensity or strength. In contrast, according to the valence-arousal conflict theory, both dimensions are interactively related: positive valence and low arousal (PL) are associated with an implicit tendency to approach a stimulus, whereas negative valence and high arousal (NH) are associated with withdrawal. Hence, positive, high-arousal (PH) and negative, low-arousal (NL) stimuli elicit conflicting action tendencies. By extending previous research that used several tasks and methods, the present study investigated whether and how emotional valence and arousal affect subjective approach vs. withdrawal tendencies toward emotional words during two novel tasks. In Study 1, participants had to decide whether they would approach or withdraw from concepts expressed by written words. In Studies 2 and 3 participants had to respond to each word by pressing one of two keys labeled with an arrow pointing upward or downward. Across experiments, positive and negative words, high or low in arousal, were presented. In Study 1 (explicit task), in line with the valence-arousal conflict theory, PH and NL words were responded to more slowly than PL and NH words. In addition, participants decided to approach positive words more often than negative words. In Studies 2 and 3, participants responded faster to positive than negative words, irrespective of their level of arousal. Furthermore, positive words were significantly more often associated with “up” responses than negative words, thus supporting the existence of implicit associations between stimulus valence and response coding (positive is up and negative is down). Hence, in contexts in which participants' spontaneous responses are based on implicit associations between stimulus valence and response, there is no influence of arousal. In line with the valence-arousal conflict theory, arousal seems to affect participants' approach-withdrawal tendencies only when such tendencies are made explicit by the task, and a minimal degree of processing depth is required.
It has been argued that several reported non-visual influences on perception cannot be truly perceptual. If they were, they should affect the perception of target objects and reference objects used to express perceptual judgments, and thus cancel each other out. This reasoning presumes that non-visual manipulations impact target objects and comparison objects equally. In the present study we show that equalizing a body-related manipulation between target objects and reference objects essentially abolishes the impact of that manipulation so as it should do when that manipulation actually altered perception. Moreover, the manipulation has an impact on judgements when applied to only the target object but not to the reference object, and that impact reverses when only applied to the reference object but not to the target object. A perceptual explanation predicts this reversal, whereas explanations in terms of post-perceptual response biases or demand effects do not. Altogether these results suggest that body-related influences on perception cannot as a whole be attributed to extra-perceptual factors.
Fear is elicited by imminent threat and leads to phasic fear responses with selective attention, whereas anxiety is characterized by a sustained state of heightened vigilance due to uncertain danger. In the present study, we investigated attention mechanisms in fear and anxiety by adapting the NPU-threat test to measure steady-state visual evoked potentials (ssVEPs). We investigated ssVEPs across no aversive events (N), predictable aversive events (P), and unpredictable aversive events (U), signaled by four-object arrays (30 s). In addition, central cues were presented during all conditions but predictably signaled imminent threat only during the P condition. Importantly, cues and context events were flickered at different frequencies (15 Hz vs. 20 Hz) in order to disentangle respective electrocortical responses. The onset of the context elicited larger electrocortical responses for U compared to P context. Conversely, P cues elicited larger electrocortical responses compared to N cues. Interestingly, during the presence of the P cue, visuocortical processing of the concurrent context was also enhanced. The results support the notion of enhanced initial hypervigilance to unpredictable compared to predictable threat contexts, while predictable cues show electrocortical enhancement of the cues themselves but additionally a boost of context processing.
Strong bottom-up impulses and weak top-down control may interactively lead to overeating and, consequently, weight gain. In the present study, female university freshmen were tested at the start of the first semester and again at the start of the second semester. Attentional bias toward high- or low-calorie food-cues was assessed using a dot-probe paradigm and participants completed the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale. Attentional bias and motor impulsivity interactively predicted change in body mass index: motor impulsivity positively predicted weight gain only when participants showed an attentional bias toward high-calorie food-cues. Attentional and non-planning impulsivity were unrelated to weight change. Results support findings showing that weight gain is prospectively predicted by a combination of weak top-down control (i.e. high impulsivity) and strong bottom-up impulses (i.e. high automatic motivational drive toward high-calorie food stimuli). They also highlight the fact that only specific aspects of impulsivity are relevant in eating and weight regulation.
Previous studies of social phobia have reported an increased vigilance to social threat cues but also an avoidance of socially relevant stimuli such as eye gaze. The primary aim of this study was to examine attentional mechanisms relevant for perceiving social cues by means of abnormalities in scanning of facial features in patients with social phobia. In two novel experimental paradigms, patients with social phobia and healthy controls matched on age, gender and education were compared regarding their gazing behavior towards facial cues. The first experiment was an emotion classification paradigm which allowed for differentiating reflexive attentional shifts from sustained attention towards diagnostically relevant facial features. In the second experiment, attentional orienting by gaze direction was assessed in a gaze-cueing paradigm in which non-predictive gaze cues shifted attention towards or away from subsequently presented targets. We found that patients as compared to controls reflexively oriented their attention more frequently towards the eyes of emotional faces in the emotion classification paradigm. This initial hypervigilance for the eye region was observed at very early attentional stages when faces were presented for 150 ms, and persisted when facial stimuli were shown for 3 s. Moreover, a delayed attentional orienting into the direction of eye gaze was observed in individuals with social phobia suggesting a differential time course of eye gaze processing in patients and controls. Our findings suggest that basic mechanisms of early attentional exploration of social cues are biased in social phobia and might contribute to the development and maintenance of the disorder.