Schizophrenia and emotional rubbernecking

Orienting toward emotionally salient information can be adaptive, as when danger needs to be avoided. Consistent with this idea, research has shown that emotionally valenced information draws attention more so than does neutral information in healthy individuals. However, at times this tendency is n...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Cognitive, affective, & behavioral neuroscience affective, & behavioral neuroscience, 2014-03, Vol.14 (1), p.202-208
Main Authors: Eich, Teal S., Smith, Edward E.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Analysis of Variance
Attention
Behavioral Science and Psychology
Cognitive Psychology
Emotions
Face
Female
Humans
Male
Memory, Short-Term
Neurosciences
Pattern Recognition, Visual
Psychological Tests
Psychology
Reaction Time
Schizophrenia
Schizophrenic Psychology
Task Performance and Analysis
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Summary:Orienting toward emotionally salient information can be adaptive, as when danger needs to be avoided. Consistent with this idea, research has shown that emotionally valenced information draws attention more so than does neutral information in healthy individuals. However, at times this tendency is not adaptive, and it may distract the individual from goals. People with schizophrenia (PSZ), though they frequently show deficits in attentional control, have also been shown to exhibit diminished recognition of and attention to emotional information. In the present study, we investigated how the presentation of emotionally salient information affected performance on a working memory task for PSZ and healthy controls (HC). We found that although hit rates were equal to those of HCs for PSZ, the PSZ made fewer false alarms—resulting in overall better performance—than did the HCs. Deficits in emotional processing in PSZ appear to provide an advantage to them in situations in which salient emotional information competes with active cognitive goals.
ISSN:1530-7026
1531-135X
DOI:10.3758/s13415-013-0214-2