Blinking our Attention Backwards: The Dual-Direction Emotional Blink of Attention

Abstract

The Emotional Blink of Attention paradigm reveals a significant relationship between emotion and attention. In the current study, we tested the effects of a forward and backward Emotional Blink of Attention (EBA) on participants’ ability to accurately report a target image in an RSVP stream. In both the forward and backward task, emotional images impaired detection of a target, with nude images being particularly debilitating. Nude images were also significantly more likely to break out of the EBA created by a target image presented 200 milliseconds beforehand than neutral or gory images were. Skin Conductance Recordings were recorded for the duration of the study to measure arousal level for each trial, but significant differences between categories were not found.