Target processing is facilitated by motivationally relevant cues.

The effect that motivationally relevant stimuli have on processes of attentional engagement and disengagement was investigated during two modified peripheral cueing paradigms. Sexual, mutilation, threatening, and neutral stimuli served as peripheral cues in both experiments. Responses were made to target location in Experiment 1 (N=19 female) and target identity in Experiment 2 (N=18 female). As indexed by enhanced target-evoked P1 and P3b component amplitudes, target processing was facilitated by the presentation of sexual and mutilation stimuli in both experiments. This facilitation in response to targets cued by sexual and mutilation stimuli occurred regardless of whether cueing was valid or invalid as demonstrated by the non-significant cue validity x picture-type interaction. As such, the processes of attentional engagement (as inferred by responses to validly cued targets) and attentional disengagement (as inferred by responses to invalidly cued targets) were not differentially affected by the motivational relevance of the preceding cue. These results indicate that in a non-clinical sample, participants can shift attention rapidly to process information following the onset of motivationally relevant stimuli at attended (valid) and unattended (invalid) locations and that target processing is facilitated by the presence of appetitive and aversive cues.

Affective picture processing and motivational relevance: arousal and valence effects on ERPs in an oddball task.

There are two dominant theories of affective picture processing; one that attention is more deeply engaged by motivationally relevant stimuli (i.e., stimuli that activate both the appetitive and aversive systems), and two that attention is more deeply engaged by aversive stimuli described as the negativity bias. In order to identify the theory that can best account for affective picture processing, event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded from 34 participants during a modified oddball paradigm in which levels of stimulus valence, arousal, and motivational relevance were systematically varied. Results were partially consistent with motivated attention models of emotional perception, as P3b amplitude was enhanced in response to highly arousing and motivationally relevant sexual and unpleasant stimuli compared to respective low arousing and less motivationally relevant stimuli. However P3b amplitudes were significantly larger in response to the highly arousing sexual stimuli compared to all other affective stimuli, which is not consistent with either dominant theory. The current study therefore highlights the need for a revised model of affective picture processing and provides a platform for further research investigating the independent effects of sexual arousal on cognitive processing.