title: Counter-regulation in affective attentional biases: a basic mechanism that warrants flexibility in emotion and motivation.
abstract: We investigated whether anticipating positive or negative future outcomes during goal pursuit has a modulatory effect on attentional biases for affectively congruent and incongruent distractor stimuli. In two experiments using a flanker task, we found that distractor interference of stimuli signaling opportunities or dangers was stronger after inducing an outcome focus of the opposite valence. The second experiment provided additional evidence that the incongruency effect reflects a global shift in affective attentional biases and is not mediated by changes in strategies or in the perceived valence of the stimuli. It is argued that counter-regulation in affective attentional biases serves an important function for the regulation of emotion and action.
authors.affiliation: Institut für Psychologie, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Am Steiger 3, Haus 1, D-07743 Jena, Germany. klaus.rothermund@uni-jena.de
authors.forename: Klaus
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Rothermund
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Voss
authors.forename: Dirk
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Wentura
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000339:Affect; D001288:Attention; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008016:Life Change Events; D008297:Male; D009042:Motivation; D020377:Self Efficacy; D012927:Social Control, Informal