title: Negative Affect, Decision Making, and Attentional Networks.
abstract: This study focuses on whether risk avoidance in decision making depends on negative affect or it is specific to anxious individuals. The Balloon Analogue Risk Task was used to obtain an objective measure in a risk situation with anxious, depressive, and control individuals. The role of attentional networks was also studied using the Attentional Network Test-Interaction (ANT-I) task with neutral stimuli. A significant difference was observed between anxious and depressive individuals in assumed risk in decision making. We found no differences between anxious and normal individuals in the alert, orientation, and congruency effects obtained in the ANT-I task. The results showed that there was no significant relationship between the risk avoidance and the indexes of alertness, orienting, and control. Future research shall determine whether emotionally relevant stimulation leads to attentional control deficit or whether differences between anxious and no anxious individuals are due to the type of strategy followed in choice tasks.
authors.affiliation: 1 University of Jaén, Spain.
authors.forename: Ana Raquel
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Ortega
authors.affiliation: 1 University of Jaén, Spain.
authors.forename: Encarnación
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Ramírez
authors.affiliation: 1 University of Jaén, Spain.
authors.forename: José María
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Colmenero
authors.affiliation: 1 University of Jaén, Spain.
authors.forename: Ma Del Rosario
authors.initials: MD
authors.lastname: García-Viedma
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000342:Affective Symptoms / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology*; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D001289:Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology*; D002755:Choice Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D003657:Decision Making / Q000502:physiology*; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009949:Orientation / Q000502:physiology; D055815:Young Adult