Introducing the Open Affective Standardized Image Set (OASIS)

The effect of image category and incidental arousal on boundary restriction

People's memory for scenes has consequences, including for eyewitness testimony. Negative scenes may lead to a particular memory error, where narrowed scene boundaries lead people to recall being closer to a scene than they were. But boundary restriction-including attenuation of the opposite phenomenon boundary extension-has been difficult to replicate, perhaps because heightened arousal accompanying negative scenes, rather than negative valence itself, drives the effect. Indeed, in Green et al. (2019) arousal alone, conditioned to a particular neutral image category, increased boundary restriction for images in that category. But systematic differences between image categories may have driven these results, irrespective of arousal. Here, we clarify whether boundary restriction stems from the external arousal stimulus or image category differences. Presenting one image category (everyday-objects), half accompanied by arousal (Experiment 1), and presenting both neutral image categories (everyday-objects, nature), without arousal (Experiment 2), resulted in no difference in boundary judgement errors. These findings suggest that image features-including inherent valence, arousal, and complexity-are not sufficient to induce boundary restriction or reduce boundary extension for neutral images, perhaps explaining why boundary restriction is inconsistently demonstrated in the lab.

Decoupling the Conflicting Evaluative Meanings in Automatically Activated Race-Based Associations

Implicit measures of attitudes have classically focused on the association between a social group and generalized valence, but debate exists surrounding how these associations arise and what they can tell us about beliefs and attitudes. Here, we suggest that representations of oppression, which relate positively to implicitly measured prejudice but negatively to explicitly measured prejudice, can serve to decrease the predictive validity of implicit measures through statistical suppression. We had participants complete a Black-White implicit association test (IAT) and an IAT measuring representations of oppression, and find that oppression-related representations statistically suppress the relation between IAT scores and explicit attitudes, such that accounting for these representations increases the total amount of variance explained by implicit measures. We discuss the implications of this work both for practical matters around use of the IAT and for theoretical debates on the conceptualization of valence in implicit attitudes.

Associations of state and chronic loneliness with interpretation bias: The role of internalizing symptoms

Loneliness is common and, while generally transient, persists in up to 22% of the population. The rising prevalence and adverse impacts of chronic loneliness highlight the need to understand its underlying mechanisms. Evolutionary models of loneliness suggest that chronically lonely individuals demonstrate negative interpretation biases towards social information. It may also be that such biases are exacerbated by momentary increases in state loneliness, or elevated anxiety or depression. Yet, little research has tested these possibilities. The current study aimed to advance understandings of loneliness by examining associations of chronic loneliness with individual differences in negative interpretation bias for social (relative to non-social) stimuli, and testing whether these associations change in the context of increased state loneliness and current levels of anxiety and depressive symptoms. These aims were explored in 591 participants who completed an interpretation bias task before and after undergoing a state loneliness induction. Participants also self-reported chronic loneliness, anxiety, and depression. Linear mixed models indicated that only state (but not chronic) loneliness was associated with more positive interpretations of non-social stimuli, with greater anxiety and depressive symptoms predicting more negative interpretations. Implications of these findings for present theoretical models of loneliness are discussed.

MEDIC: Development and validation of a new instrument to assess emotional reactivity to medical stimuli in a representative community sample of adults

To support investigation of the etiology and psychophysiology of medical traumatic stress, we developed a standardized set of emotionally-salient medical images, called the 'MEDical Image Collection' (MEDIC), for use in neuroimaging or psychological research. This study aimed to establish internal consistency, test re-test reliability, and congruent validity of the image set. A representative sample of 300 adults in the United States were recruited via research recruitment platform, Prolific. Participants rated 124 images depicting medical stimuli on one of two dimensions: emotional arousal (i.e., how strongly an evoked emotion is felt) or affective valence (i.e., how positive or negative the evoked emotion is). Sociodemographic and health-related characteristics, including experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic, were also assessed. To assess test re-test reliability, a subset (n = 200) rated the images on the same dimension a second time, 3 months later. The MEDIC image set was found to: (a) elicit a range of emotional arousal and valence ratings, (b) have excellent inter-rater reliability, (c) moderate test-retest reliability, and (d) good face validity. Results indicate the new MEDIC 124-image set is a reliable and valid instrument, enabling researchers to provide context-specific and emotionally-salient stimuli to individuals when studying affective responses in relation to health and medicine.

Towards virtual reality exposure therapy for cocaine use disorder: A feasibility study of inducing cocaine craving through virtual reality

Background

Craving is a core symptom of cocaine use disorders (CUD). Inducing craving in exposure to substance cues is of relevant interest for numerous clinical applications. Virtual reality exposure (VRE) might be a promising candidate for improving cue-exposure paradigms but remains almost not studied for cocaine. This feasibility study's main aim is to assess whether VRE to cocaine cues is capable to induce cocaine craving compared with VRE to neutral cues.

Methods

We conducted a within-subjects controlled trial in which cocaine users performed 3 consecutive 10 mins-tasks: VRE to neutral and cocaine cues, and a relaxation-based resting procedure. The primary outcome was the change in Cocaine Craving Questionnaire-Brief (CCQ-Brief) scores between VRE to neutral and cocaine cues. Secondary outcomes included between-tasks changes in scores of cocaine craving, pleasant/unpleasant emotions as well as self-efficacy to cope with craving.

Results

We recruited 11 chronic cocaine users including mostly crack smokers (45 %), cocaine snorters (36 %) and injectors (18 %), with 73 % of participants meeting DSM-IV criteria for cocaine dependence and/or abuse. Non-parametrical sign tests indicated significant large increases of CCQ-Brief scores from neutral to cocaine cue-VRE (S(11) = 11, p < 0.01, Cliff's Δ = 0.65, 95 % CI: 0.17-0.88). Exploratory comparative analyses indicated significant changes after our post-cues VRE relaxation procedure, with cocaine craving and emotions restored to baseline.

Conclusions

VRE to cocaine cues was feasible and capable to induce cocaine craving in cocaine users. This second VRE-based cue-reactivity study in cocaine paves the way for unexplored research on VRE clinical applications for CUD.

Enhanced source memory for emotionally valenced sources: does an affective orienting task make the difference?

Previous research on whether source memory is enhanced for emotionally valenced sources yielded inconclusive results. To identify potential boundary conditions, we tested whether encoding instructions that promote affective versus different types of non-affective item-source-processing foster versus hamper source-valence effects. In both experiments, we used neutral words as items superimposed on emotional (positive & negative) or neutral pictures as sources. Source pictures were selected based on valence and arousal ratings collected in a pre-study such that only valence varied across sources. Source memory was measured via multinomial modelling. In Experiment 1, we applied an affective, item-focused orienting task (OT; i.e. word-pleasantness ratings) during item-source encoding and found enhanced source memory for emotionally valenced (positive & negative) compared to neutral sources. In Experiment 2, we systematically manipulated encoding instructions and again found enhanced source memory for emotionally valenced sources with an affective OT. No such effects occurred in the non-affective conditions, where participants were instructed to integrate item and source (item-source-fit judgments), to focus on the item (living-non-living judgments), or to encode the items only, respectively. With intentional item encoding, however, source memory was surprisingly better for positive than negative sources. We conclude that source-valence effects might unfold only under affective processing.

Moderating effect of negative emotion differentiation in chronic stress and fatigue among Chinese employees

Introduction

According to the reactivity hypothesis and the diathesis-stress model, repeated activation of the stress system has a negative effect on health, and this effect may differ because of individual characteristics. Thus, the present study explores the effect of chronic stress on fatigue and investigates its mechanism.

Methods

A questionnaire survey of 288 participants selected from the northwest part of China was conducted (13.89% females; ages ranged from 18 to 34 years, with M ± SD = 23.14 ± 3.79 years) on chronic stress, fatigue, depression, anxiety, and negative emotion differentiation. SPSS 28.0 was used to process descriptive statistics and correlation analysis and the PROCESS macro was used to analyze the moderated chained multi-mediation.

Results

Chronic stress was found to be positively correlated with fatigue, depression, and anxiety; depression and anxiety played a chained multi-mediating role between chronic stress and fatigue, and negative emotion differentiation played a moderating role in the chained multi-mediation model.

Discussion

Compared with depression, anxiety plays a more important role in the influence of chronic stress on fatigue. Therefore, it is necessary to pay more attention to anxiety symptoms and take appropriate intervention measures. Negative emotion differentiation plays a moderating role. Improving negative emotion differentiation through mindfulness and adaptive emotion regulation is an effective way to reduce the influence of chronic stress on fatigue.

Haptic coordination: Squeezing a vibrating stress ball decreases anxiety and arousal

We evaluated the effect of haptic coordination on anxiety and arousal. Participants looked at a stressful or calming image and then repeatedly squeezed a vibrating stress ball for 20 s. Using a pre-post paradigm with a control group, we showed that squeezing the vibrating ball reduced anxiety and arousal, as assessed by the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory and electrodermal activity, respectively. The stability of haptic coordination was manipulated by varying the detuning between the spontaneous squeezing frequency and the intrinsic frequency of ball vibration. Coordination stability affected arousal and stress affected stability. The data were discussed in the light of Kahneman's attentional resource-sharing model.

Do uncontrolled processes contribute to evaluative learning? Insights from a new two-US process dissociation procedure and ambivalence measures

The contribution of uncontrolled processes to evaluative learning has been examined in evaluative conditioning procedures by comparing evaluations of conditioned stimuli between tasks or within tasks but between learning instruction conditions. In the present research, we introduced a new procedure that keeps both tasks and instructions constant. In addition, we introduced ambivalence measures to address this uncontrollability question. The new procedure involves forming an impression of conditioned stimuli based on their pairing with one unconditioned stimulus while attending but discarding the influence of another unconditioned stimulus holding the same (congruent trials) versus a different (incongruent trials) valence. When the to-be-used and to-be-discarded unconditioned stimuli share the same (vs. a different) valence, controlled and uncontrolled processes should support the same (vs. opposite) responses. We used this approach in two preregistered experiments (Ntotal = 467) using dichotomous evaluative classifications (Experiments 1 and 2), evaluative ratings, and two measures of attitudinal ambivalence: mouse trajectories and felt ambivalence (Experiment 2). While we failed to find evidence for uncontrolled processes in evaluative classification frequencies separately in Experiments 1 and 2, analyses of aggregated classification frequencies across Experiments 1 and 2 suggested a small contribution of uncontrolled processes. In addition, we found larger felt ambivalence for incongruent than congruent trials. Overall, the present findings are mixed but support the possibility of a contribution of uncontrolled processes to evaluative learning, even when control is applied to a focal stimulus and additional influences come from a to-be-disregarded stimulus.

Sex-Dependent Differences in the Neural Correlates of Cocaine and Emotional Cue-Reactivity in Regular Cocaine Users and Non-Drug-Using Controls: Understanding the Role of Duration and Severity of Use

INTRODUCTION

The development of cocaine use disorder in females is suggested to be more strongly related to neural mechanisms underlying stress-reactivity, whereas in males it is suggested to be more strongly related to neural mechanisms underlying drug cue-reactivity. Existing evidence, however, is based on neuroimaging studies that either lack a control group and/or have very small sample sizes that do not allow to investigate sex differences.

METHODS

The main objective of the current study was to investigate sex differences in the neural correlates of cocaine and negative emotional cue-reactivity within high-risk intranasal cocaine users (CUs: 31 males and 26 females) and non-cocaine-using controls (non-CUs: 28 males and 26 females). A region of interest (ROI) analysis was applied to test for the main and interaction effects of group, sex, and stimulus type (cocaine cues vs. neutral cocaine cues and negative emotional cues vs. neutral emotional cues) on activity in the dorsal striatum, ventral striatum (VS), amygdala, and dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC).

RESULTS

There were no significant sex or group differences in cocaine cue-reactivity in any of the ROIs. Results did reveal significant emotional cue-reactivity in the amygdala and VS, but these effects were not moderated by group or sex. Exploratory analyses demonstrated that emotional cue-induced activation of the dACC and VS was negatively associated with years of regular cocaine use in female CUs, while this relationship was absent in male CUs.

CONCLUSIONS

While speculative, the sex-specific associations between years of regular use and emotional cue-reactivity in the dACC and VS suggest that, with longer years of use, female CUs become less sensitive to aversive stimuli, including the negative consequences of cocaine use, which could account for the observed "telescoping effect" in female CUs.

Symptom provocation in obsessive-compulsive disorder: Validation of the Braga Obsessive Compulsive image set (BOCIS)

Symptom provocation paradigms are paramount to understand a heterogeneous disorder as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). The main aim of our work was to develop and validate an open-access set of OCD-related images comprising three main subtypes: washing, checking, and symmetry. Twenty-six OCD patients and 25 controls provided valence and arousal ratings for a set of OCD-related, aversive, and neutral images. Linear mixed model analyses were used to estimate the main effects of group, image category, and group-image category interaction in image ratings. All main effects were found to be significant for both arousal and valence ratings, except for the group in arousal ratings. Path analysis confirmed our hypothesis that the OCI-R subscales influenced the subjective ratings of the corresponding image categories, particularly among patients. Independent samples t-tests were performed for each OCD picture to compose the set. Arousal demonstrated a greater capacity to distinguish controls and patients, thus sustaining our choice of using these ratings for the final Braga Obsessive-Compulsive Image Set (BOCIS). Our study demonstrated that the stimuli of the BOCIS reliably portray OCD-like triggers for washing, checking and symmetry subtypes. Its open-access availability will facilitate significant progress in both clinical and research settings.

Stimulus valence moderates self-learning

Self-relevance has been demonstrated to impair instrumental learning. Compared to unfamiliar symbols associated with a friend, analogous stimuli linked with the self are learned more slowly. What is not yet understood, however, is whether this effect extends beyond arbitrary stimuli to material with intrinsically meaningful properties. Take, for example, stimulus valence an established moderator of self-bias. Does the desirability of to-be-learned material influence self-learning? Here, in conjunction with computational modelling (i.e. Reinforcement Learning Drift Diffusion Model analysis), a probabilistic selection task was used to establish if and how stimulus valence (i.e. desirable/undesirable posters) impacts the acquisition of knowledge relating to object-ownership (i.e. owned-by-self vs. owned-by-friend). Several interesting results were observed. First, undesirable posters were learned more rapidly for self compared to friend, an effect that was reversed for desirable posters. Second, learning rates were accompanied by associated differences in reward sensitivity toward desirable and undesirable choice selections as a function of ownership. Third, decisional caution was greater for self-relevant (vs. friend relevant) responses. Collectively, these findings inform understanding of self-function and how valence and stimulus relevance mutually influence probabilistic learning.

Negative emotions enhance memory-guided attention in a visual search task by increasing frontoparietal, insular, and parahippocampal cortical activity

Previous literature demonstrated that long-term memory representations guide spatial attention during visual search in real-world pictures. However, it is currently unknown whether memory-guided visual search is affected by the emotional content of the picture. During functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), participants were asked to encode the position of high-contrast targets embedded in emotional (negative or positive) or neutral pictures. At retrieval, they performed a visual search for targets presented at the same location as during encoding, but at a much lower contrast. Behaviorally, participants detected more accurately targets presented in negative pictures compared to those in positive or neutral pictures. They were also faster in detecting targets presented at encoding in emotional (negative or positive) pictures than in neutral pictures, or targets not presented during encoding (i.e., memory-guided attention effect). At the neural level, we found increased activation in a large circuit of regions involving the dorsal and ventral frontoparietal cortex, insular and parahippocampal cortex, selectively during the detection of targets presented in negative pictures during encoding. We propose that these regions might form an integrated neural circuit recruited to select and process previously encoded target locations (i.e., memory-guided attention sustained by the frontoparietal cortex) embedded in emotional contexts (i.e., emotional contexts recollection supported by the parahippocampal cortex and emotional monitoring supported by the insular cortex). Ultimately, these findings reveal that negative emotions can enhance memory-guided visual search performance by increasing neural activity in a large-scale brain circuit, contributing to disentangle the complex relationship between emotion, attention, and memory.

Time and memory distrust shape the dynamics of recollection and belief-in-occurrence

The current study examined how people's metamemory judgments of recollection and belief-in-occurrence change over time. Furthermore, we examined to what extent these judgments are affected by memory distrust - the subjective appraisal of one's memory functioning - as measured by the Memory Distrust Scale (MDS) and the Squire Subjective Memory Scale (SSMQ). Participants (N = 234) studied pictorial stimuli and were tested on some of these stimuli later in the same session, but were tested on other stimuli 1, 2, 4, 8, and 17 days later. Recollection and belief ratings were correlated highly and followed similar declining patterns over time. However, belief decreased relatively more slowly than recollection, such that the discrepancy between recollection and belief increased over time. Memory distrust moderated the association between recollection and belief, with this association being weaker among people who reported greater (versus lower) memory distrust. Memory distrust also interacted with retention period to predict memory judgments. Two measures of memory distrust diverged in their predictive power. In particular, only the MDS predicted the spontaneous reporting of nonbelieved memories. Our results provide support to the theoretical perspective that belief-in-occurrence is a summative judgment informed not only by recollective phenomenology but also by metamemorial beliefs.

Testing the automaticity features of the affect misattribution procedure: The roles of awareness and intentionality

The affect misattribution procedure (AMP) is a measure of implicit evaluations, designed to index the automatic retrieval of evaluative knowledge. The AMP effect consists in participants evaluating neutral target stimuli positively when preceded by positive primes and negatively when preceded by negative primes. After multiple prior tests of intentionality, Hughes et al. (Behav Res Methods 55(4):1558-1586, 2023) examined the role of awareness in the AMP and found that AMP effects were larger when participants indicated that their response was influenced by the prime than when they did not. Here we report seven experiments (six preregistered; N = 2350) in which we vary the methodological features of the AMP to better understand this awareness effect. In Experiments 1-4, we establish variability in the magnitude of the awareness effect in response to variations in the AMP procedure. By introducing further modifications to the AMP procedure, Experiments 5-7 suggest an alternative explanation of the awareness effect, namely that awareness can be the outcome, rather than the cause, of evaluative congruency between primes and responses: Awareness effects emerged even when awareness could not have contributed to AMP effects, including when participants judged influence awareness for third parties or primes were presented post hoc. Finally, increasing the evaluative strength of the primes increased participants' tendency to misattribute AMP effects to the influence of target stimuli. Together, the present findings suggest that AMP effects can create awareness effects rather than vice versa and support the AMP's construct validity as a measure of unintentional evaluations of which participants are also potentially unaware.

Integrative processing in artificial and biological vision predicts the perceived beauty of natural images

Previous research shows that the beauty of natural images is already determined during perceptual analysis. However, it is unclear which perceptual computations give rise to the perception of beauty. Here, we tested whether perceived beauty is predicted by spatial integration across an image, a perceptual computation that reduces processing demands by aggregating image parts into more efficient representations of the whole. We quantified integrative processing in an artificial deep neural network model, where the degree of integration was determined by the amount of deviation between activations for the whole image and its constituent parts. This quantification of integration predicted beauty ratings for natural images across four studies with different stimuli and designs. In a complementary functional magnetic resonance imaging study, we show that integrative processing in human visual cortex similarly predicts perceived beauty. Together, our results establish integration as a computational principle that facilitates perceptual analysis and thereby mediates the perception of beauty.

A conditional judgment procedure for probing evaluative conditioning effects in the absence of feelings of remembering

Attitude research has capitalized on evaluative conditioning procedures to gain insight into how evaluations are formed and may be changed. In evaluative conditioning, a conditioned stimulus (CS; e.g., an unfamiliar soda brand) is paired with an unconditioned stimulus (US) of affective value (e.g., a pleasant picture). Following this pairing, a change in CS liking may be observed (e.g., the soda brand is liked better). A question with far-reaching theoretical and practical implications is whether the change in CS liking is found when participants feel they do not remember the CS-US pairings at the time an evaluation is produced about the CS. Here, we introduce a new conditional judgment procedure-the two-button-sets (TBS) task-for probing evaluative conditioning effects without feelings of remembering about the valence of the US paired with the CS. In three experiments, the TBS is (1) is successfully validated; it is also used to (2) provide preliminary information on the feeling of remembering question, and (3) to examine an affect-consistent bias in memory judgments for CS-US pairings. Results do not support evaluative effects in the absence of feelings of remembering, and they oppose the view that affect-consistent bias is limited to memory uncertainty. We discuss these findings in light of previous evidence and of dual-learning models of attitudes. We also discuss limitations and research avenues related to the new procedure.

Validation of the Edited Tromsø Infant Faces Database (E-TIF): A study on differences in the processing of children's emotional expressions

Images of emotional facial expressions are often used in emotion research, which has promoted the development of different databases. However, most of these standardized sets of images do not include images from infants under 2 years of age, which is relevant for psychology research, especially for perinatal psychology. The present study aims to validate the edited version of the Tromsø Infant Faces Database (E-TIF) in a large sample of participants. The original set of 119 pictures was edited. The pictures were cropped to remove nonrelevant information, fitted in an oval window, and converted to grayscale. Four hundred and eighty participants (72.9% women) took part in the study, rating the images on five dimensions: depicted emotion, clarity, intensity, valence, and genuineness. Valence scores were useful for discriminating between positive, negative, and neutral facial expressions. Results revealed that women were more accurate at recognizing emotions in children. Regarding parental status, parents, in comparison with nonparents, rated neutral expressions as more intense and genuine. They also rated sad, angry, disgusted, and fearful faces as less negative, and happy expressions as less positive. The editing and validation of the E-TIF database offers a useful tool for basic and experimental research in psychology.

Validation of the open biological negative image set for a Portuguese population: Comparing Japanese and Portuguese samples and an exploration of low-order visual properties of the stimuli

Recently, Shirai and Watanabe Royal Society Open Science, 9(1), 211128 (2022) developed OBNIS (Open Biological Negative Image Set), a comprehensive database containing images (primarily animals but also fruits, mushrooms, and vegetables) that visually elicit disgust, fear, or neither. OBNIS was initially validated for a Japanese population. In this article, we validated the color version of OBNIS for a Portuguese population. In study 1, the methodology of the original article was used. This allowed direct comparisons between the Portuguese and Japanese populations. Aside from a few emotional classification mismatches between disgust, fear, or neither-related images, we found that arousal and valence relate distinctively in both populations. In contrast to the Japanese sample, the Portuguese reported increased arousal for more positive valenced stimuli, suggesting that OBNIS images elicit positive emotions in the Portuguese population. These results showed important cross-cultural differences regarding OBNIS. In study 2, a methodological change was introduced: instead of the three classification options used originally (fear, disgust, or neither), six basic emotions were used (fear, disgust, sadness, surprise, anger, happiness), and a "neither" option, to confirm whether some of the originally "neither-related" images are associated with positive emotions (happiness). Additionally, the low-order visual properties of images (luminosity, contrast, chromatic complexity, and spatial frequency distribution) were explored due to their important role in emotion-related research. A fourth image group associated with happiness was found in the Portuguese sample. Moreover, image groups present differences regarding the low-order visual characteristics, which are correlated with arousal and valence ratings, highlighting the importance of controlling such characteristics in emotion-related research.

Synchronized Incidental Affect Changes Ambiguity Preferences

Decisions under uncertainty are prevalent, but come under two distinct types. Risk, which has unknown outcomes but known probabilities for those outcomes and ambiguity which contains both unknown outcomes and unknown probabilities. Although there have been several studies linking affect and aversion to ambiguity, there have been no studies that have to identify how changing one's affective response can change their choices. A total of 166 adults ( M = 36.54, SD = 11.80) participated in an online study through Prolific. Participants were presented with a lottery on each trial which varied on its uncertainty type (risky vs ambiguous) and winning characteristics (winning probability and amount). Half of the ambiguous lotteries were paired with an neutral image (e.g., office supplies), while the other half was paired with an emotionally evocative image (e.g., burning house) that was hypothesized to incidentally influence their decisions. As measured by both raw choice data as well as through a computational model, participants were more averse to ambiguity when the lottery was paired with an emotionally evocative image. Follow-up analyses revealed that only lotteries in which the computational model predicted the participant would choose the lottery were affected by the images. This study highlights the phenomenon in which one's awareness of an affective stimulus can alter its impact on their decisions.

The effect of negative arousal on declarative memory

Arousing events influence retrieval success, with a number of studies supporting a context-dependent effect of arousal on episodic memory retrieval. An improvement in speed and accuracy of episodic memories is observed when negative arousal is attached to them. In contrast, enhancing effects of negative arousal have not been reported to improve semantic memory retrieval. Episodic and semantic memory are highly interactive and yet differ based on their embedded contextual content. Although differences in brain activity exist between episodic and semantic memory, the two types of memory retrieval are part of a common long-term memory system. Considering the shared processes between episodic and semantic memory, the objectives of the current study were twofold: i) to examine, employing a novel paradigm, whether performance on episodic and semantic memory retrieval would be influenced differently by varying levels of arousal, between negative and neutral valence; and ii) to explore the neural patterns underlying these processes. Forty-seven healthy young adults were recruited and completed the experiment in the MRI scanner. The results demonstrated a negative arousal effect on the brain circuitry subserving both memory conditions as well as on behavioural performance, as indicated by better accuracy and faster reaction times. The study provides an insight into the role of negative arousal in memory processes and contributes to our understanding of the interplay between cognitive and emotional factors in memory modulation. Our work also highlights the highly interactive nature of episodic and semantic memory, and emphasises the importance in understanding how negative arousal interacts with the contextual content of a memory, on a behavioural and neurofunctional level.

Modelling individual aesthetic judgements over time

Listening to music, watching a sunset-many sensory experiences are valuable to us, to a degree that differs significantly between individuals, and within an individual over time. We have theorized (Brielmann & Dayan 2022 Psychol. Rev. 129, 1319-1337 (doi:10.1037/rev0000337))) that these idiosyncratic values derive from the task of using experiences to tune the sensory-cognitive system to current and likely future input. We tested the theory using participants' (n = 59) ratings of a set of dog images (n = 55) created using the NeuralCrossbreed morphing algorithm. A full realization of our model that uses feature representations extracted from image-recognizing deep neural nets (e.g. VGG-16) is able to capture liking judgements on a trial-by-trial basis (median r = 0.65), outperforming predictions based on population averages (median r = 0.01). Furthermore, the model's learning component allows it to explain image sequence dependent rating changes, capturing on average 17% more variance in the ratings for the true trial order than for simulated random trial orders. This validation of our theory is the first step towards a comprehensive treatment of individual differences in evaluation. This article is part of the theme issue 'Art, aesthetics and predictive processing: theoretical and empirical perspectives'.

How evaluative pairings improve body dissatisfaction in adult women: evidence from a randomized-controlled online study

BACKGROUND

Many young women are dissatisfied with their bodies. This study investigated the effect on current body dissatisfaction levels of a newly developed evaluative conditioning procedure that paired self-similar and self-dissimilar images of bodies with positive and neutral affective images, respectively. We hypothesized that learning the contingency that self-similar bodies predict positive affectivity is one process that could aid in explaining how these procedures function.

METHODS

Adult women without disordered eating pathology participated in an online experiment with random assignment to an intervention or a control condition. All participants initially rated body images in self-similarity and were subsequently asked to categorize positive and neutral images by valence as quickly and accurately as possible. In the intervention condition, self-similar bodies systematically preceded positive images, and self-dissimilar images preceded neutral images, creating a similar body → positive contingency. Pairings in the control condition were unsystematic such that no contingency was present. We measured categorization latencies and accuracies to infer contingency learning as well as current body dissatisfaction immediately before and after exposure to the pairings. All participants further completed measures of trait body image concerns and disordered eating psychopathology at baseline, which we examined as moderators of an expected relation between condition assignment, contingency learning, and body dissatisfaction improvements.

RESULTS

We analyzed data from N = 173 women fulfilling the inclusion criteria. Moderated mediation analyses showed that assignment to the intervention (vs. control) condition predicted increased similar body → positive contingency learning, which in turn predicted improved body dissatisfaction post-intervention, but only among women with higher pre-existing trait body image concerns or disordered eating levels.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings point toward the relevancy of further exploring the utility of pairing procedures. Similar body → positive contingency learning predicted improved body dissatisfaction in individuals with normatively high body image concerns, which suggests pairing procedures could help inform future research on reducing body dissatisfaction.

Boosting interpersonal emotion regulation through facial imitation: functional neuroimaging foundations

Empathic function, which is primarily manifested by facial imitation, is believed to play a pivotal role in interpersonal emotion regulation for mood reinstatement. To explore this association and its neural substrates, we performed a questionnaire survey (study l) to identify the relationship between empathy and interpersonal emotion regulation; and a task-mode fMRI study (study 2) to explore how facial imitation, as a fundamental component of empathic processes, promotes the interpersonal emotion regulation effect. Study 1 showed that affective empathy was positively correlated with interpersonal emotion regulation. Study 2 showed smaller negative emotions in facial imitation interpersonal emotion regulation (subjects imitated experimenter's smile while followed the interpersonal emotion regulation guidance) than in normal interpersonal emotion regulation (subjects followed the interpersonal emotion regulation guidance) and Watch conditions. Mirror neural system (e.g. inferior frontal gyrus and inferior parietal lobe) and empathy network exhibited greater activations in facial imitation interpersonal emotion regulation compared with normal interpersonal emotion regulation condition. Moreover, facial imitation interpersonal emotion regulation compared with normal interpersonal emotion regulation exhibited increased functional coupling from mirror neural system to empathic and affective networks during interpersonal emotion regulation. Furthermore, the connectivity of the right orbital inferior frontal gyrus-rolandic operculum lobe mediated the association between the accuracy of facial imitation and the interpersonal emotion regulation effect. These results show that the interpersonal emotion regulation effect can be enhanced by the target's facial imitation through increased functional coupling from mirror neural system to empathic and affective neural networks.

A Pilot Study Testing A New Visual Stimuli Database for Probing Men's Gender Role Conflict: GRASP (Gender Role Affective Stimuli Pool)

Gender Role Conflict (GRC) yields intensive psychological discomfort due to restrictive gender roles. However, there is no visual stimuli database portraying GRC contexts/domains. The goal of this pilot study is to assemble stimuli (a) reflecting GRC contexts and (b) rate them on emotional dimensions (valence, arousal, uneasiness), for norming purposes. Initially, 53 photos were included from the Nencki Affective Picture System and the internet. Based on the four GRC domain definitions, we divided the photos into four categories. Straight and gay men (n = 22) rated each photo on (i) the extent to which it depicted a GRC domain, (ii) the three emotional dimensions. Photos rated above scale midpoint as depicting a GRC domain were classified accordingly and comprised the "Gender Role Affective Stimuli Pool" (GRASP) with 31 photos. Straight participants rated Restricted Emotionality (RE) and Restrictive Affectionate Behavior Between Men (RABBM) photos as less pleasant (low valence) than gay men. High GRC participants rated RE photos as more pleasant and arousing and RABBM ones as more uneasiness-inducing than low GRC participants. Men seem to differentiate their affective reaction to photos illustrating GRC domains; hence, GRASP may be useful to future experimental research examining cognitive and affective consequences of men's adherence to gender roles.

Inducing emotionally negative nonbelieved memories using negative pictures

Memories that can be recalled but are no longer believed are termed nonbelieved memories. The current studies examined the creation of emotionally negative nonbelieved memories after viewing negatively valenced pictures. In both experiments, participants took part in two sessions. In Session 1, after being presented with a set of neutral and negative pictures, participants had to rate their emotional state. One week later, in Session 2, participants had to complete a recognition task to identify pictures that had appeared during the previous session. During this task, participants' memories for some pictures were challenged by telling them that their answers were incorrect in order to evoke nonbelieved memories. The experimental procedure was successful in creating nonbelieved memories in the participants. Specifically, in Experiment 1 (N = 35), we induced nonbelieved true memories for both negative and neutral pictures. We found a significant decrease in both belief and recollection after the challenge, with the change in belief being twice as large as the change in recollection. In Experiment 2 (N = 43), we successfully induced both nonbelieved true and false memories for negative pictures. Again, the reduction of belief was significantly greater than that of recollection. In general, participants evinced better memory for negative pictures, but following challenges people were just as likely to accept false social feedback and change their memories regarding other types of pictures. In both experiments, our challenges did not lead to notable changes in emotional state. In general, our findings show that emotionally negative nonbelieved memories can be successfully evoked in an experimental setting.

Sharing Data Is Essential for the Future of AI in Medical Imaging

If we want artificial intelligence to succeed in radiology, we must share data and learn how to share data.

Understanding Naturalistic Facial Expressions with Deep Learning and Multimodal Large Language Models

This paper provides a comprehensive overview of affective computing systems for facial expression recognition (FER) research in naturalistic contexts. The first section presents an updated account of user-friendly FER toolboxes incorporating state-of-the-art deep learning models and elaborates on their neural architectures, datasets, and performances across domains. These sophisticated FER toolboxes can robustly address a variety of challenges encountered in the wild such as variations in illumination and head pose, which may otherwise impact recognition accuracy. The second section of this paper discusses multimodal large language models (MLLMs) and their potential applications in affective science. MLLMs exhibit human-level capabilities for FER and enable the quantification of various contextual variables to provide context-aware emotion inferences. These advancements have the potential to revolutionize current methodological approaches for studying the contextual influences on emotions, leading to the development of contextualized emotion models.

Emotional Bias among Individuals at Risk for Seasonal Affective Disorder-An EEG Study during Remission in Summer

Emotional bias in attention and memory is well researched in depression. Patients with depression prioritize processing of negative information over positive input. While there is evidence that emotional bias exists in seasonal affective disorder (SAD) during winter, it is unclear whether such altered cognition exists also during summer. Moreover, it is unclear whether such bias affects attention, memory, or both. In this study, we investigated 110 individuals in summer, 34 of whom reported suffering from low mood during winter, according to the seasonal pattern assessment questionnaire. While the electroencephalogram was recorded, participants learned 60 emotional pictures and subsequently were asked to recognize them in an old/new task. There were no clear group differences in behavioral measures, and no brain response differences in frontal alpha power during learning. During recognition, at 100-300 ms post stimulus individuals with higher seasonality scores exhibited larger alpha power in response to negative as compared to neutral stimuli, while individuals with low seasonality scores exhibited larger alpha power in response to positive as compared to neutral stimuli. While we cannot draw conclusions whether this is an effect of attention or memory, the finding suggests that early cognitive processes are altered already during summer in individuals with increased likelihood to experience SAD during winter. Our data provide evidence for an all-year-round cognitive vulnerability in this population.

Emotional visual stimuli and simulated laparoscopic surgical performance: A pilot cohort study

BACKGROUND

Exposure to stress prior to or during surgery can negatively impact performance. Management of stress is an essential non-technical skill required for safe practice. The effects of exposure to emotional visual stressors on surgical performance are poorly understood. This study aims to develop a model to investigate effects of emotive visual stimuli on simulated laparoscopic performance.

METHODS AND MATERIALS

A single-centre cohort study. Thirty novice, simulator-naïve medical students were randomly allocated to view either positive, negative, or neutral emotional images (sourced from validated image registry). Participants focused for 5 s on the image before completing a peg-threading laparoscopic task. Time, instrument distance, speed, acceleration, motion smoothness, and ambidexterity were recorded automatically with instrument tracking software. 8 task cycles were completed; 3 control practices followed by 5 with the stimuli, according to group allocation.

RESULTS

The final performance metrics of students (time, distance, speed, and motion smoothness) were not significantly different when comparing positive and neutral stimuli groups to those shown negative stimuli. However, changes were seen in the rate of performance improvements (positive: p = 0.711, p = 0.837, p = 0.297, and p = 0.393) (neutral: p = 0.285, p = 0.918, p = 0.835, and p = 0.396). Participation improved performance metrics overall (p=<0.001, p=<0.001, p = 0.088, p = 0.025, p=<0.001).

CONCLUSION

Model systems may be valuable for investigating the impact of stress on surgeon performance. The effect of emotive visual stimuli on surgical performance is complex. This model may aid the further exploration of these relationships and ultimately can provide an environment in which surgeons can develop strategies to mitigate the adverse effect of stressors.

A scoping review and index of body stimuli in psychological science

Naturalistic body stimuli are necessary for understanding many aspects of human psychology, yet there are no centralized databases of body stimuli. Furthermore, there are a high number of independently developed stimulus sets lacking in standardization and reproducibility potential, and a general lack of organization, contributing to issues of both replicability and generalizability in body-related research. We conducted a comprehensive scoping review to index and explore existing naturalistic whole-body stimuli. Our research questions were as follows: (1) What sets of naturalistic human whole-body stimuli are present in the literature? And (2) On what factors (e.g., demographics, emotion expression) do these stimuli vary? To be included, stimulus sets had to (1) include human bodies as stimuli; (2) be photographs, videos, or other depictions of real human bodies (not computer generated, drawn, etc.); (3) include the whole body (defined as torso, arms, and legs); and (4) could include edited images, but still had to be recognizable as human bodies. We identified a relatively large number of existing stimulus sets (N = 79) which offered relative variability in terms of main manipulated factors and the degree of visual information included (i.e., inclusion of heads and/or faces). However, stimulus sets were demographically homogenous, skewed towards White, young adult, and female bodies. We identified significant issues in reporting and availability practices, posing a challenge to the generalizability, reliability, and reproducibility of body-related research. Accordingly, we urge researchers to adopt transparent and accessible practices and to take steps to diversify body stimuli.

Associations between self-reported sleep, overnight memory consolidation, and emotion perception: A large-scale online study in the general population

Experimental studies suggest that short or disrupted sleep impairs memory consolidation, mood, and perception of emotional stimuli. However, studies have chiefly relied on laboratory-based study designs and small sample sizes. The aim of this fully online and pre-registered study was to investigate the association between sleep and overnight memory consolidation, emotion perception, and affect in a large, self-selected UK sample. A total of 1646 participants (473 completed) took part in an online study, where they completed a declarative (word-pairs) memory task, emotion perception task (valence ratings of images), and rated their affect within 2 h of bed-time. The following morning, participants reported on their state affect, sleep for the previous night, completed a cued recall task for the previously presented word-pairs, rated the valence of previously viewed images, and completed a surprise recognition task. Demographic data and habitual sleep quality and duration (sleep traits) were also recorded. Habitual sleep traits were associated with immediate recall for the word-pairs task, while self-reported sleep parameters for the specific night were not associated with overnight memory consolidation. Neither habitual sleep traits, nor nightly sleep parameters were associated with unpleasantness ratings to negative stimuli or overnight habituation. Habitual poor sleep was associated with less positive and more negative affect, and morning affect was predicted by the specific night's sleep. This study suggests that overnight emotional processing and declarative memory may not be associated with self-reported sleep across individuals. More work is needed to understand how findings from laboratory-based studies extrapolate to real-world samples and contexts.

The maintenance of complex visual scenes in working memory may require activation of working memory manipulation circuits in the dlPFC

Past research has shown that the bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortices (dlPFC) are implicated in both emotional processing as well as cognitive processing, 1,2,3 in addition to working memory 4, 5 . Exactly how these disparate processes interact with one another within the dlPFC is less understood. To explore this, researchers designed an experiment that looked at working memory performance during fMRI under both emotional and non-emotional task conditions. Participants were asked to complete three tasks (letters, neutral images, emotional images) of the Sternberg Sorting Task under one of two trial conditions (sort or maintain). Regions of interest consisted of the left and right dlPFC as defined by brain masks based on NeuroSynth 6 . Results showed a significant main effect of the 'sort' condition on reaction speed for all three trial types, as well as a main effect of task type (letters) on accuracy. In addition, a significant interaction was found between trial type (sort) and task type (letters), but not for either of the picture tasks. These results reveal a discrepancy between BOLD signal and behavioral data, with no significant difference in BOLD activity during image trials being displayed, despite longer response times for every condition. While these results show that the dlPFC is clearly implicated in non-emotional cognitive processing, more research is needed to explain the lack of BOLD activation seen here for similar emotionally valanced tasks, possibly indicating involvement of other brain networks.

No threat: Emotion regulation neurofeedback for police special forces recruits

Police officers of the Special Forces are confronted with highly demanding situations in terms of stress, high tension and threats to their lives. Their tasks are specifically high-risk operations, such as arrests of armed suspects and anti-terror interventions. Improving the emotion regulation skills of police officers might be a vital investment, supporting them to stay calm and focused. A promising approach is training emotion regulation by using real-time (rt-) fMRI neurofeedback. Specifically, downregulating activity in key areas of the fronto-limbic emotion regulation network in the presence of threatening stimuli. Thirteen recruits of the Dutch police special forces underwent six weekly rt-fMRI sessions, receiving neurofeedback from individualized regions of their emotion regulation network. Their task was to reduce the image size of threatening images, wherein the image size represented their brain activity. A reduction in image size represented successful downregulation. Participants were free to use their preferred regulation strategy. A control group of fifteen recruits received no neurofeedback. Both groups completed behavioural tests (image rating on evoked valence and arousal, questionnaire) before and after the neurofeedback training. We hypothesized that the neurofeedback group would improve in downregulation and would score better than the control group on the behavioural tests after the neurofeedback training. Neurofeedback training resulted in a significant decrease in image size (t(12) = 2.82, p = .015) and a trend towards decreased activation in the target regions (t(10) = 1.82, p = .099) from the first to the last session. Notably, subjects achieved downregulation below the pre-stimulus baseline in the last two sessions. No relevant differences between groups were found in the behavioural tasks. Through the training of rt-fMRI neurofeedback, participants learned to downregulate the activity in individualized areas of the emotion regulation network, by using their own preferred strategies. The lack of behavioural between-group differences may be explained by floor effects. Tasks that are close to real-life situations may be needed to uncover behavioural correlates of this emotion regulation training.

Physiological Arousal, Attentiveness, Emotion, and Word Retrieval in Aphasia: Effects and Relationships

PURPOSE

This study aimed to (a) compare physiological arousal and attentiveness during a confrontational naming task between participants with aphasia and a control group across four conditions that varied according to emotionality of presented stimuli and (b) explore relationships among physiological arousal, attentiveness, perceived arousal, and naming performance. We hypothesized that participants with aphasia would show lower levels of arousal and attentiveness than control participants and that emotional conditions would lead to increased physiological arousal and attentiveness.

METHOD

Eight participants with aphasia and 15 control participants completed a confrontational naming task under positive, negative, and neutral conditions and rated their perceived arousal after each. Electrophysiological recordings were taken during the entire experiment to obtain measures of heart rate (HR), HR variability, and skin conductance (SC). Videos of confrontational naming trials were rated based on visual signs of participant attentiveness during each trial.

RESULTS

Statistically significant group differences were found for HR, SC, and attentiveness ratings, but no differences were found in these measures among conditions. Correlational analyses revealed statistically significant relationships between attentiveness and response time, HR, and naming accuracy. Significant correlations were also found for HR and naming accuracy as well as perceived arousal and naming accuracy.

CONCLUSIONS

Findings suggest that decreased physiological arousal or attentiveness may contribute to naming deficits for people with aphasia (PWA). Assisting PWA to fully attend to and engage in therapy tasks may be important for accurate assessment of language functions and for achieving optimal benefit in treatment.

Development of a Universal Validation Protocol and an Open-Source Database for Multi-Contextual Facial Expression Recognition

Facial expression recognition (FER) poses a complex challenge due to diverse factors such as facial morphology variations, lighting conditions, and cultural nuances in emotion representation. To address these hurdles, specific FER algorithms leverage advanced data analysis for inferring emotional states from facial expressions. In this study, we introduce a universal validation methodology assessing any FER algorithm's performance through a web application where subjects respond to emotive images. We present the labelled data database, FeelPix, generated from facial landmark coordinates during FER algorithm validation. FeelPix is available to train and test generic FER algorithms, accurately identifying users' facial expressions. A testing algorithm classifies emotions based on FeelPix data, ensuring its reliability. Designed as a computationally lightweight solution, it finds applications in online systems. Our contribution improves facial expression recognition, enabling the identification and interpretation of emotions associated with facial expressions, offering profound insights into individuals' emotional reactions. This contribution has implications for healthcare, security, human-computer interaction, and entertainment.

More than a feeling: Effects of competitive asymmetry on human emotions

Competitive interactions have important effects on human emotions. Both victory and defeat can evoke a wide range of emotional reactions, including joy, pride, anger, fear, sadness and shame. However, little is known about what determines this variety of contestants' affective responses. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of competitive asymmetry, a common and ecologically relevant feature of animal conflicts, on human emotional responses to winning or losing a contest. To test this hypothesis, we conducted two experiments, the first with high school students (n = 331) and the second with young athletes (n = 73), in which we manipulated the outcomes of successive matches in a non-athletic competition. Thus, by inducing the competitors' scores, ranging from closer to more decisive outcomes, we were able to define the degree of competitive asymmetry in victory and defeat conditions. We then assessed participants' emotional responses to a set of affective stimuli. In the defeat condition, we found in both studies an increase in the occurrence of anger and fear due to more symmetric contests. There were also more frequent reports of shame following more decisive defeats (Experiment 1) and of pride following closer victories (Experiment 2), which were seen neither for sadness nor joy in any of the studies. Supporting our hypothesis, emotional reactions triggered by asymmetries among contestants were consistent with the behavioral patterns commonly seen in symmetric and asymmetric animal conflict, such as dominance/aggressive and defensive/escape behaviors.

Boosting affective control with bifrontal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS): a proof-of-concept study in healthy individuals

Affective control refers to the ability to regulate emotions and is considered a marker of mental health. Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), a non-invasive brain stimulation technique, holds promise to enhance affective control. In this between-subjects study in healthy individuals, we investigated the effects of bifrontal tDCS on core processes and higher-level markers of affective control. As such, we assessed direct tDCS effects on emotional interference during an affective control task and indirect effects on an instructed reappraisal task afterward. Results showed that the affective control task combined with active tDCS, compared to sham, resulted in enhanced cognitive emotion regulation. Specifically, participants in the active tDCS condition showed an increased propensity to use reappraisal and were more successful in doing so. Moreover, there was reduced vagally mediated heart rate variability indicative of attenuated emotion and self-regulation, in the sham, but not in the active condition. Surprisingly, there were no effects of tDCS on emotional interference during the affective control task, with Bayesian analyses showing extreme evidence against these effects. Nevertheless, there was a positive association between the emotional interference during the affective control task and participants' reappraisal success afterward for the active, but not the sham tDCS condition. The study offers valuable insights to guide future work on combined tDCS with affective control tasks or training on the ability to regulate emotions.

Sensitivity to intrinsic rewards is domain general and related to mental health

Humans frequently engage in intrinsically rewarding activities (for example, consuming art, reading). Despite such activities seeming diverse, we show that sensitivity to intrinsic rewards is domain general and associated with mental health. In this cross-sectional study, participants online (N = 483) were presented with putative visual, cognitive and social intrinsic rewards as well as monetary rewards and neutral stimuli. All rewards elicited positive feelings (were 'liked'), generated consummatory behaviour (were 'wanted') and increased the likelihood of the action leading to them (were 'reinforcing'). Factor analysis revealed that ~40% of response variance across stimuli was explained by a general sensitivity to all rewards, but not to neutral stimuli. Affective aspects of mental health were associated with sensitivity to intrinsic, but not monetary, rewards. These results may help explain thriving and suffering: individuals with high reward sensitivity will engage in a variety of intrinsically rewarding activities, eventually finding those they excel at, whereas low sensitivity individuals will not.

The Affective Dynamics of Everyday Digital Life: Opening Computational Possibility

Up to now, there was no way to observe and track the affective impacts of the massive amount of complex visual stimuli that people encounter "in the wild" during their many hours of digital life. In this paper, we propose and illustrate how recent advances in AI-trained ensembles of deep neural networks-can be deployed on new data streams that are long sequences of screenshots of study participants' smartphones obtained unobtrusively during everyday life. We obtained affective valence and arousal ratings of hundreds of images drawn from existing picture repositories often used in psychological studies, and a new screenshot repository chronicling individuals' everyday digital life from both N = 832 adults and an affect computation model (Parry & Vuong, 2021). Results and analysis suggest that (a) our sample rates images similarly to other samples used in psychological studies, (b) the affect computation model is able to assign valence and arousal ratings similarly to humans, and (c) the resulting computational pipeline can be deployed at scale to obtain detailed maps of the affective space individuals travel through on their smartphones. Leveraging innovative methods for tracking the emotional content individuals encounter on their smartphones, we open the possibility for large-scale studies of how the affective dynamics of everyday digital life shape individuals' moment-to-moment experiences and well-being.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s42761-023-00202-4.

The effects of left prefrontal stimulation on selective attention and emotional reactivity for positive and negative information

Transcranial direct current stimulation targeting lateral prefrontal areas may attenuate attentional vigilance for negative content and reduce emotional reactivity. However, little research to date has examined how such stimulation may affect attention towards and emotional reactivity to positive emotional content. The aim of this study was to examine whether anodal tDCS targeting the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex would affect attentional bias towards either or both negative and positive content, and similarly, how it would impact emotional reactivity to negative and positive emotional content among healthy individuals. Unselected participants (N = 101) were recruited (Mage = 22.57, SD = 5.60; 66.33% female) and allocated to either an active or sham tDCS condition. Attentional bias was measured using an eye-tracking task involving negative-neutral and positive-neutral image pairs, followed by an emotional reactivity assessment task involving negative and positive video content (self-report and heart rate variability). Results showed no evidence that tDCS influenced attentional patterns towards either positive or negative information, nor was there evidence that tDCS influenced self-reported anxious mood or physiological arousal. However, participants in the active tDCS condition reported higher positive mood in response to both the positive and negative videos compared to those in the sham condition and also higher arousal in response to positive content and lower arousal in response to negative content, with those in the sham tDCS condition showing the reverse pattern of effects. As such, tDCS effects on emotional reactivity to positive and negative content were restricted to self-report measures.

Is there an emotionality effect in older adults' source memory?

The goal of our research was to investigate whether older adults show a source memory enhancement for emotionally valenced sources. Additionally, building on research on the socioemotional selectivity theory and the age-related positivity effect, we tested whether older adults show a larger enhancement for positive compared to negative (and neutral) sources than younger adults. In Experiment 1 (nold = 25, nyoung = 27), we used one positive, one negative, and one neutral picture to manipulate source valence (many-to-one mapping of items to sources), whereas, in Experiment 2 (nold = 62, nyoung = 62), we used multiple pictures per source valence category (one-to-one mapping of items to sources) to counteract potential habituation effects. In both experiments, sources had medium and matching arousal levels. Items were neutral words superimposed on the source pictures. To support an implicit, natural information processing, participants rated the words in terms of pleasantness. We analyzed memory data with a multinomial processing tree model to disentangle memory processes from guessing bias. Across both experiments, an age-related positivity effect occurred in participants' pleasantness ratings. This effect, however, did not carry over to older adults' source memory. That is, in source memory, we found a general emotionality effect for younger but not for older adults and no age-related positivity effect. We propose that due to older adults' pronounced difficulties in remembering the item-to-source link (i.e., associative deficit), even a greater focus on an inherently emotional source might be insufficient to boost source memory.

Spider vs. guns: expectancy and attention biases to phylogenetic threat do not extend to ontogenetic threat

Introduction

Attention bias plays an important role in specific fears and phobias. Previous studies revealed that a-priori expectancies affect attention toward neutral stimuli but not threatening stimuli. The aim of the current study was to test whether this selective influence of expectancies on attention is specific to phylogenetic threat (i.e., spiders) or whether it can be generalized to ontogenetic threat (i.e., guns). Correspondingly, we directly compared expectancy effects on attentional allocation to phylogenetically vs. ontogenetically threatening stimuli.

Method

Expectancies were manipulated by presenting a cue indicating the likelihood of the appearance of a deviant picture in a visual search array. The array included eight distractors and one neutral (phone/bird) or threatening (gun/spider) deviant picture. In a comprehensive design, we examined the effects of stimulus type (phylogenetic/ontogenetic) and visual background (white and sterile/complex and ecological). Individual differences such as intolerance of uncertainty and spider fear were also measured.

Results

Results showed that attention bias toward spiders does not extend to threatening ontogenetic stimuli (i.e., guns). Our previous findings on attention bias toward spiders were replicated and a small to medium positive correlation was found between reaction time to bird targets and pre-existing fear of spider levels. Cues were used to detect threatening as well as neutral targets on both background types, except for spider targets on a complex background, replicating previous results. A small to medium positive correlation was also found between fear of spiders and intolerance of uncertainty.

Discussion

Together, these results suggest that expectancy and attentional processes may differ between ontogenetic and phylogenetic threat. Importantly, the effects of expectancy on attentional allocation depend on an interaction between the type of threat (ontogenetic/phylogenetic), visual factors, and individual differences.

Little Evidence for the Role of Disgust Sensitivity in Implicit Disgust to Images of White People Engaged in Injecting Drug Use (IDU)

Background: Previous research has shown that People Who Inject Drugs (PWID) are subject to public stigma, which affects access to, and provision and quality of, treatment and support services. Less is known about the socio-cognitive processes that support the development and maintenance of public stigma toward PWID. The present study investigated the role of disgust sensitivity in implicit disgust to injecting drug use. Methods: 126 participants took part in an online Implicit Association Task (IAT) measuring implicit disgust to pictorial stimuli of injecting drug use or medical injecting. Participants also completed The Disgust Scale Revised, Injecting Phobia Scale (Short Form), Attitudes to People Who Use Drugs (PWUD) scale and a substance use inventory. Results: Average IAT score was negative indicating significantly higher implicit disgust to injecting drug use. Hierarchical linear regression found that injecting phobia predicted implicit disgust to injecting drug use. Questionnaire measures of disgust did not predict implicit disgust. While animal reminder disgust and injecting phobia were significantly correlated with each other, animal reminder disgust did not predict implicit disgust scores. Conclusions: On the basis of our findings, stigma toward PWID may not be a result of feelings of disgust toward injecting drug use. We discuss findings in the context of the underlying cortical processes supporting implicit and explicit representations of disgust. Future research should seek to investigate neurophysiological evidence for disgust to and stigmatization of injecting drug use and the potential role of domains of disgust in this.

Examining the impact of cue similarity and fear learning on perceptual tuning

Past research on the effects of associative aversive learning on discrimination acuity has shown mixed results, including increases, decreases, and no changes in discrimination ability. An animal study found that the type of learning experience determined the direction and extent of learning-induced changes. The current preregistered web-based study aimed to translate these findings to humans. Experiment 1 (N = 245) compared changes in stimulus discrimination between simple learning (only one oriented grating cue), coarse differential conditioning (physically distinct cues), and fine differential conditioning (physically similar cues) as well as to their three respective control groups. The discrimination task consisted of a two-alternative-forced-choice task with oriented grating stimuli. During learning, a specific orientation was paired with unpleasant pictures. Our analysis using generative modeling demonstrated weak to moderate evidence that aversive learning did not alter discrimination acuity in any of the groups. In a follow-up experiment (N = 121), we replicated these findings despite successful learning trajectories in all three groups and a more detailed assessment of discrimination acuity. Contrary to prior assumptions, our findings indicate that aversive learning does not enhance perceptual discrimination, and the presence of additional safety cues does not appear to moderate this effect.

The roles of inflammation, affect, and interoception in predicting social perception

"Sickness behavior" is an orchestrated suite of symptoms that commonly occur in the context of inflammation, and is characterized by changes in affect, social experience, and behavior. However, recent evidence suggests that inflammation may not always produce the same set of sickness behavior (e.g., fatigue, anhedonia, and social withdrawal). Rather, inflammation may be linked with different behavior across contexts and/or across individuals, though research in this area is under-developed to-date. In the present study (n = 30), we evaluated the influence of affective context and individual differences in difficulty detecting bodily sensations (i.e., interoceptive difficulty) on social perception following an inflammatory challenge. Inflammation was induced using the influenza vaccine and inflammatory reactivity was operationalized as changes in circulating levels of interleukin-6 (IL-6) before the vaccine and approximately 24 h later. Twenty-four hours after administration of the influenza vaccine, we manipulated affective context using a well-validated affect misattribution task in which participants made trustworthiness judgments of individuals with neutral facial expressions following the rapid presentation of "prime" images that were positive or negative in affective content. Interoceptive difficulty was measured at baseline using a validated self-report measure. Results revealed significant interactions between inflammatory reactivity to the influenza vaccine and affective context on social perception. Specifically, individuals with greater inflammatory reactivity were more biased by affective context when judging the trustworthiness of neutral faces. In addition, interoceptive difficulty and affective context interacted to predict social perception such that individuals with greater interoceptive difficulty were more biased by affective context in these judgments. In sum, we provide some of the first evidence that inflammation may amplify the saliency of affective cues during social decision making. Our findings also replicate prior work linking interoceptive ability to the use of affect-as-information during social perception, but in the novel context of inflammation.

Articulation dynamics and evaluative conditioning: investigating the boundary conditions, mental representation, and origin of the in-out effect

People prefer linguistic stimuli with an inward (e.g. BODIKA) over those with an outward articulation dynamic (e.g. KODIBA), a phenomenon known as the articulatory in-out effect. Despite its robustness across languages and contexts, the phenomenon is still poorly understood. To learn more about the effect's boundary conditions, mental representation, and origin, we crossed the in-out effect with evaluative conditioning research. In five experiments (N = 713, three experiments pre-registered), we systematically paired words containing inward versus outward dynamics with pictures of negative versus positive valence. Although this evaluative conditioning procedure reversed the preference for inward over outward words, this was the case only for words with the same consonant sequences as the conditioned words. For words with inward/outward dynamics but different consonant sequences than the conditioned ones, a regular in-out effect emerged. Also, no preference reversal at all emerged for the conditioned consonant sequences when the contingency between single consonants at specific positions and positive/negative valence was zero. Implications of these findings for the in-out effect and evaluative conditioning are discussed.

Using a haptic dynamic clamp to reduce arousal: preference, arousal, and coordination stability are related

We have developed a haptic dynamic clamp dedicated to the regulation of arousal. It takes the form of a vibrating stress ball to be squeezed, called Viball, controlled by Righetti's nonlinear adaptive Hopf oscillator. Participants squeezed an adaptive Viball which adapts its frequency of vibration to the current frequency of human squeezing. The adaptive Viball was compared to three non-adaptive Viballs, parametrized to vibrate at a lower, equal, or higher frequency than the participants' preferred frequency. While squeezing the ball, participants looked at stressful or calming pictures and their electrodermal activity was recorded. Using the preference paradigm, we show that participants preferred to interact with the adaptive Viball rather than with the most slowly vibrating ball that most strongly reduced arousal. The stability of the human-ball coordination was the highest with the adaptive Viball. There was also a positive correlation between the stability of coordination and arousal. The data are discussed in light of the energy-based interpretation of coordination dynamics.

Rumination burdens the updating of working memory

Working memory is a vital, but capacity-limited, cognitive instrument that requires frequent updating as our goals and environment change. Individuals diagnosed with depression have a reduced capacity compared with the general population, as they have a propensity to fixate on negative information, even when it is not relevant for the task at hand. Here we investigated how characteristics of psychiatric illnesses, such as rumination, affect a person's ability to efficiently update emotional information in mind. We used both neutral and negative pictures of scenes in a working memory updating task that required participants to occasionally replace items held in mind during a brief delay period. Participants were presented with a probe item at the end of each trial and asked to report whether that item was in their current memory set. Responses were slowest and least accurate for images that had been replaced (i.e., "lures"), indicating there was some difficulty in successfully updating working memory in this paradigm. Participants who have both a high propensity to ruminate and a low working memory capacity were significantly more likely to false alarm to these lures. While emotional valence did not impact accuracy for these participants, their false alarms were faster for negative stimuli compared with neutral stimuli, indicating that task-irrelevant emotional information was more difficult to remove from working memory. These results demonstrate how rumination impairs goal-directed behavior by obscuring the boundary between relevant and irrelevant information in working memory.