Emotional event-related potentials are larger to figures than scenes but are similarly reduced by inattention

Abstract

BackgroundIn research on event-related potentials (ERP) to emotional pictures, greater attention to emotional than neutral stimuli (i.e., motivated attention) is commonly indexed by two difference waves between emotional and neutral stimuli: the early posterior negativity (EPN) and the late positive potential (LPP). Evidence suggests that if attention is directed away from the pictures, then the emotional effects on EPN and LPP are eliminated. However, a few studies have found residual, emotional effects on EPN and LPP. In these studies, pictures were shown at fixation, and picture composition was that of simple figures rather than that of complex scenes. Because figures elicit larger LPP than do scenes, figures might capture and hold attention more strongly than do scenes. Here, we showed negative and neutral pictures of figures and scenes and tested first, whether emotional effects are larger to figures than scenes for both EPN and LPP, and second, whether emotional effects on EPN and LPP are reduced less for unattended figures than scenes.ResultsEmotional effects on EPN and LPP were larger for figures than scenes. When pictures were unattended, emotional effects on EPN increased for scenes but tended to decrease for figures, whereas emotional effects on LPP decreased similarly for figures and scenes.ConclusionsEmotional effects on EPN and LPP were larger for figures than scenes, but these effects did not resist manipulations of attention more strongly for figures than scenes. These findings imply that the emotional content captures attention more strongly for figures than scenes, but that the emotional content does not hold attention more strongly for figures than scenes.

Threat modulates neural responses to looming visual stimuli

“…The LPP before stimulus offset was evaluated as the activity at the central recording sites (Cz, Pz) from 400 to 1000 ms after stimulus onset. The LPP after stimulus offset was evaluated as the activity at the central recording sites (Cz, Pz) at time window 1400–1800 ms after stimulus onset (Cacioppo et al ., ; Ito et al ., ; Hajcak & Nieuwenhuis, ; Hajcak & Olvet, ; Hajcak & Dennis, ; Michalowski et al ., ; Bailey et al ., ; Nordström & Wiens, ).…”

“…There are two components that are thought to index the greater attention paid to emotional relative to neutral stimuli (i.e. motivated attention; Lang et al ., ) – the early posterior negativity (EPN) and the late positive potential (LPP; Nordström & Wiens, ). The EPN reflects a transient negativity over the posterior region of the scalp between 200 and 300 ms after stimulus onset.…”

“…The EPN selects for further processing of affectively arousing stimuli (Olofsson et al ., ). The EPN was evaluated as the activity at the occipital–parietal recording sites (T7, P7, PO7, PO3, O1, Oz, POz, T8, P8, PO8, PO4, O2) at the time window between 200 and 300 ms after stimulus onset (Hajcak & Dennis, ; Michalowski et al ., ; Bailey et al ., ; Nordström & Wiens, ).…”

Perceptual processing of natural scenes at rapid rates: Effects of complexity, content, and emotional arousal

“…Previous studies have clearly determined that emotional engagement when pictures of natural scenes are viewed is strongest for pictures that depict people in sexual, violent, and other highly arousing emotional contexts (Bradley, Codispoti, Cuthbert, & Lang, 2001; Lang & Bradley, 2010; Schupp et al, 2004; Weinberg & Hajcak, 2010) and, furthermore, that an electrophysiological index of enhanced processing, the late positive potential, is of greatest amplitude when emotionally arousing pictures that are simple figure–ground compositions are viewed (Bradley, Hamby, Löw, & Lang, 2007; Nordström & Wiens, 2012). Perceptual enhancement for highly arousing emotional scenes during RSVP suggests that, in addition to perceptual composition and the presence of faces, some emotional features show perceptual facilitation.…”

Fearful Attention: Investigating Event-related Potentials in Spider Phobia

“…Further, studies have shown that effects of emotion on EPN are independent of task-relevance (Junghöfer, Bradley, Elbert & Lang, 2001;Schupp, Junghöfer, Wike, & Hamm, 2003b;Schupp et al, 2003a). However, EPN amplitudes are correlated with picture composition (Nordström & Wiens, 2012;Wiens, Sand, & Olofsson, 2011).…”