Event-related potentials of non-mediated obsessive-compulsive disorder patients in an emotional Stroop task / 中华行为医学与脑科学杂志

Objective To study the difference of attentional bias towards general negative words between non-mediated obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) patients and healthy controls.Methods Event-related potentials (ERPs) were collected from 26 non-mediated OCD patients and 24 normal controls while they performed an emotional Stroop task.Results Compared to healthy controls,OCD patients showed significantly longer reaction time (OCD:(467 ± 14.88) ms,Controls:(409.65 ± 15.49) ms,P＜ 0.01),and had significantly larger P2 and P3 amplitude to all three types of words (P2 amplitude:OCD:(10.41±0.49) μV,Controls:(8.89±0.48) μV,P＜0.05;P3 amplitude:(10.04±0.68) μV,Controls:(7.68±0.67) μV,P＜0.05).In addition,the P2 peak latency of the frontal area in OCD patients was significantly longer than that in healthy controls(OCD:(190.09±4.71) ms,Controls:(179.60±4.72) ms,P＜0.05).Conclusion Current findings suggest that OCD patients are characterized by a general attentional inhibition deficit but not an attentional bias to the negative words.

Avaliação da ansiedade e do processamento da atenção em universitários através da tarefa de Stroop Emocional / Assessment of anxiety and attentional processing in undergraduate students using the Emotional Stroop task

O Stroop Emocional vem sendo utilizado com notável frequência nos últimos anos, sendo a tarefa de avaliação do viés de atenção mais usada em experimentos para este fim. O objetivo deste estudo foi comparar o viés de atenção para palavras emocionais em pessoas com diferentes níveis de ansiedade de traço e de estado usando o Stroop Emocional. Os participantes foram estudantes universitários (n=111, M=21,6 anos de idade) que responderam ao IDATE. No Stroop Emocional, foram utilizados 20 pares de palavras com alto nível de ativação e valência negativa, pareadas com imagens controle neutras, advindas do Affective Norms for English Words (ANEW). Apesar de ter sido observado parcialmente o efeito Stroop nesta amostra, tais resultados indicaram que a ansiedade de traço ou estado não são importantes para o viés de atenção para estímulos negativos com altos níveis de ativação.

The Emotional Stroop task has been used with remarkable frequency in recent years and is the most often used task of assessing the attentional bias in experiments for this purpose. This study aimed to compare the attentional bias toward emotional words in individuals with different levels of state and trait anxiety using the Emotional Stroop task. Participants were undergraduate students (n=111, M=21.6 years) who responded to the STAI. In the Emotional Stroop task, were used 20 pairs of words with high activation and negative valence, and matched controls with neutral images, coming from the Affective Norms for English Words (ANEW). Although the Stroop effect in this sample was partly observed, these results indicated that trait and state anxiety are not important to the attentional bias toward negative stimuli with high levels of activation.

Viés atencional no abuso de drogas: teoria e método / Attentional bias in drug abuse: theory and method

O viés atencional pode eliciar fissura, diminuir a concentração em tarefas não relacionadas à droga e aumentar a vulnerabilidade à recaída em dependentes de drogas. O objetivo deste estudo é discutir visões teóricas recentes e principais métodos de investigação do papel do viés atencional nos comportamentos aditivos. Realizou-se busca nas bases de dados Medline, Pubmed e Lilacs. Essa busca revelou que a dot-probe task e o teste emocional de Stroop estão entre os principais métodos de investigação do viés atencional. Também foram apontadas limitações metodológicas nas investigações sobre viés atencional, sugerindo que esse fenômeno deve ser estudado sob condições melhor controladas, que considerem níveis de dependência, privação e fissura. Estudar o viés atencional pode contribuir para identificar mecanismos cognitivos subjacentes aos comportamentos aditivos.

Attentional bias to drug-related cues can induce craving, decrease concentration on non-related drug tasks and increase vulnerability to relapse in drug addicts. The aim of this study is to discuss current theories and research methods about the attentional bias role on addictive behaviors. The literature review of Medline, Pubmed and Lilacs databases showed that the dot-probe task and the emotional Stroop test are among the main methods of attentional bias investigation. This review also pointed out the methodological limitations in attentional bias research, suggesting that this phenomenon should be studied under better controlled conditions, which should consider levels of dependence, withdrawal and craving. Further studies on attentional bias can help to understand cognitive processes that underlie addictive behaviors.