The effect of valence on young and older adults' attention in a rapid serial visual presentation task.
Using a rapid serial visual presentation task, the authors examined how the emotional valence of a word affected young and older adults' abilities to detect another word that closely followed it in temporal proximity. Both age groups detected neutral words better when such words followed a positive or negative arousing word rather than a neutral arousing word. These results suggest that emotion influences attention in a similar fashion for young and older adults. Despite evidence that older adults can sometimes show a "positivity effect" in memory, we found no evidence of increased attention toward positive words for older adults.
Department of Psychology, Boston College, McGuinn Hall, 140 Commonwealth Ave., Chestnut Hill, MA 02467, USA. mickley@bc.edu
Katherine R Mickley
KR
Steinmetz
Keely A
KA
Muscatell
Elizabeth A
EA
Kensinger
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D004644:Emotions; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D011930:Reaction Time; D012660:Semantics; D012691:Serial Learning; D014706:Verbal Learning; D055815:Young Adult