Predispositions to approach and avoid are contextually sensitive and goal dependent.
The authors show that predispositions to approach and avoid do not consist simply of specific motor patterns but are more abstract functions that produce a desired environmental effect. It has been claimed that evaluating a visual stimulus as positive or negative evokes a specific motor response, extending the arm to negative stimuli, and contracting to positive stimuli. The authors showed that a large congruency effect (participants were faster to approach pleasant and avoid unpleasant stimuli, than to approach unpleasant and avoid pleasant stimuli) could be produced on a novel touchscreen paradigm (Experiment 1), and that the congruency effect could be reversed by spatial (Experiment 2) and nonspatial (Experiment 3) response effects. Thus, involuntary approach and avoid response activations are not fixed, but sensitive to context, and are specifically based on the desired goal.
Bamford
Susan
S
Wolfson Centre for Clinical and Cognitive Neuroscience, Bangor University, UK. s.bamford@bangor.ac.uk
Ward
Robert
R
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001143:Arousal; D001288:Attention; D001362:Avoidance Learning; D003220:Conflict, Psychological; D003469:Culture; D003657:Decision Making; D004644:Emotions; D005149:Facial Expression; D005260:Female; D006040:Goals; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009042:Motivation; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D011930:Reaction Time; D012660:Semantics