Positive affect increases the breadth of attentional selection
Edited by Edward E. Smith, Columbia University, New York, NY, and approved October 29, 2006
Abstract
The present study examined the thesis that positive affect may serve to broaden the scope of attentional filters, reducing their selectivity. The effect of positive mood states was measured in two different cognitive domains: semantic search (remote associates task) and visual selective attention (Eriksen flanker task). In the conceptual domain, positive affect enhanced access to remote associates, suggesting an increase in the scope of semantic access. In the visuospatial domain, positive affect impaired visual selective attention by increasing processing of spatially adjacent flanking distractors, suggesting an increase in the scope of visuospatial attention. During positive states, individual differences in enhanced semantic access were correlated with the degree of impaired visual selective attention. These findings demonstrate that positive states, by loosening the reins on inhibitory control, result in a fundamental change in the breadth of attentional allocation to both external visual and internal conceptual space.
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank Itria Ma, Stephanie Tsicos, and Angela Romano for assisting with data collection and Lynn Hasher for generously providing testing space for pilot data collection. This work was funded by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council discovery grant (A.K.A.).
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© 2006 by The National Academy of Sciences of the USA.
Submission history
Received: June 21, 2006
Published online: January 2, 2007
Published in issue: January 2, 2007
Keywords
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank Itria Ma, Stephanie Tsicos, and Angela Romano for assisting with data collection and Lynn Hasher for generously providing testing space for pilot data collection. This work was funded by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council discovery grant (A.K.A.).
Notes
This article is a PNAS direct submission.
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The authors declare no conflict of interest.
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Cite this article
Positive affect increases the breadth of attentional selection, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.
104 (1) 383-388,
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0605198104
(2007).
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