Acute Stress and Perceptual Load Consume the Same Attentional Resources: A Behavioral-ERP Study

Stress and perceptual load affect selective attention in a paradoxical manner. They can facilitate selectivity or disrupt it. This EEG study was designed to examine the reciprocal relations between stress, load and attention. Two groups of subjects, one that performed the Trier Social Stress Test (T...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2016-05, Vol.11 (5), p.e0154622-e0154622
Main Authors: Tiferet-Dweck, Chen, Hensel, Michael, Kirschbaum, Clemens, Tzelgov, Joseph, Friedman, Alon, Salti, Moti
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Analysis
Attention
Attention - physiology
Attentional bias
Behavior
Biology and Life Sciences
Brain research
Cohort Studies
Electroencephalography
Emotions
Event-related potentials
Evoked Potentials - physiology
Female
Hormones
Humans
Hydrocortisone - metabolism
Hypotheses
Information processing
Laboratories
Latency
Load
Localization
Male
Medicine and Health Sciences
Neurosciences
Physiology
Psychology
Reaction Time - physiology
Research and Analysis Methods
Saliva - metabolism
Selectivity
Social interactions
Social Sciences
Stress
Stress (Psychology)
Stress, Psychological
Stresses
Studies
Visual Perception - physiology
Visual task performance
Windows (intervals)
Young Adult
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Summary:Stress and perceptual load affect selective attention in a paradoxical manner. They can facilitate selectivity or disrupt it. This EEG study was designed to examine the reciprocal relations between stress, load and attention. Two groups of subjects, one that performed the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST), and a control group, were asked to respond to a target letter under low and high perceptual load in the absence or presence of a distractor. In the control group, the distractor increased response times (RTs) for high and low load. In the TSST group, distractor increased RTs under low load only. ERPs showed that distractor's presentation attenuated early visual P1 component and shortened its latency. In the TSST group, distractor reduced P1 component under high load but did not affect its latency. Source localization demonstrated reduced activation in V1 in response to distractors presence in the P1 time window for the TSST group compared to the control group. A behavioral replication revealed that in the TSST group distractors were less perceived under high load. Taken together, our results show that stress and perceptual load affect selectivity through the early stages of visual processing and might increase selectivity in a manner that would block conscious perception of irrelevant stimuli.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0154622