Working Memory Load and Negative Picture Processing: Neural and Behavioral Associations With Panic, Social Anxiety, and Positive Affect.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Internalizing disorders such as anxiety may be characterized by an imbalance between bottom-up (stimulus-driven) and top-down (goal-directed) attention. The late positive potential (LPP) can be used to assess these processes when task-irrelevant negative and neutral pictures are presented within a working memory paradigm. Prior work using this paradigm has found that working memory load reduces the picture-elicited LPP across participants; however, anxious individuals showed a reduced effect of working memory load on the LPP, suggesting increased distractibility.

Methods

The current study assessed transdiagnostic associations between specific symptom dimensions of anxiety, the LPP, and behavior in a clinically representative, heterogeneous group of 76 treatment-se

SUBMITTER: MacNamara A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6197936 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature