Trait anxiety and attentional bias in policemen / 中国心理卫生杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective: To investigate the characteristics of attentional bias in emotional faces of policemen with different trait anxiety levels. Methods: By using the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), 44 policemen (23 males and 21 females) were included in the higher trait anxiety level group and 44 policemen (25 males and 19 females) were included in the lower trait anxiety level group. The 2 anxiety style ((higher trait anxiety level, lower trait anxiety level) × 2 emotional type (positive, negative) × 2 clue type (identical side, opposite side) hybrid design was used to investigate the attentional bias of the response time differences between the two groups of policemen on keystroke responses of different emotional types and different types of clues by using a dot probe. Results: The positive emotional face reaction of the higher trait anxiety level group was less than that of the negative emotional face reaction[ (638. 0 ± 12. 4) ms vs. (651. 7 ± 13. 1) ms, P ＜ 0. 01], while the lower trait anxiety level police had no statistical significance on the reaction of positive emotional face and negative emotional face (P＞ 0. 05). The clue types in the higher trait anxiety level group were identical side less than opposite side response time [ (640. 3 ± 12. 6) ms vs. (649. 5 ± 13. 0) ms, P ＜ 0. 05], and there was no statistical significance in the lower trait anxiety level group about identical side and opposite side response time (P＞ 0. 05). The clue type in identical side, there was no significant difference in the response of two groups to positive emotional faces and negative emotional faces (P＞ 0. 05); while the clue type in opposite side, the response of higher trait anxiety level group to negative emotional faces was higher than that of positive emotional faces [ (663. 1 ± 9. 8) ms vs. (651. 4 ± 8. 9) ms, P ＜ 0. 05]. Conclusion: It suggests that the policemen with higher level of trait anxiety have selective attentional bias to negative emotional faces, which induced by impaired attentional disengagement.