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Age-related emotional bias in processing two emotionally valenced tasks

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Abstract

Previous studies suggest that older adults process positive emotions more efficiently than negative emotions, whereas younger adults show the reverse effect. We examined whether this age-related difference in emotional bias still occurs when attention is engaged in two emotional tasks. We used a psychological refractory period paradigm and varied the emotional valence of Task 1 and Task 2. In both experiments, Task 1 was emotional face discrimination (happy vs. angry faces) and Task 2 was sound discrimination (laugh, punch, vs. cork pop in Experiment 1 and laugh vs. scream in Experiment 2). The backward emotional correspondence effect for positively and negatively valenced Task 2 on Task 1 was measured. In both experiments, younger adults showed a backward correspondence effect from a negatively valenced Task 2, suggesting parallel processing of negatively valenced stimuli. Older adults showed similar negativity bias in Experiment 2 with a more salient negative sound (“scream” relative to “punch”). These results are consistent with an arousal-bias competition model [Mather and Sutherland (Perspectives in Psychological Sciences 6:114–133, 2011)], suggesting that emotional arousal modulates top-down attentional control settings (emotional regulation) with age.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Bernhard Hommel, Mara Mather, Jennifer Stanley, and one anonymous reviewer for comments on earlier versions of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, The University of Akron, Akron, OH, 44325-4301, USA

    Philip A. Allen

  2. School of Psychological Science, Oregon State University, Corvallis, USA

    Mei-Ching Lien

  3. Department of Psychology, Cleveland State University, Cleveland, USA

    Elliott Jardin

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  1. Philip A. Allen
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Allen, P.A., Lien, MC. & Jardin, E. Age-related emotional bias in processing two emotionally valenced tasks. Psychological Research 81, 289–308 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-015-0711-8

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