Age-related differences in attentional bias for emotional faces.
Past research suggests an aging-related positivity effect in orienting to faces. However, these studies have eschewed direct comparison of orienting when positive and negative faces are presented simultaneously, thereby potentially underestimating the degree to which emotional valence influences such effects. In the current study younger and older adults viewed face pairs for 1000 ms, and upon face-pair offset indicated the location of a dot that appeared in the former location of one of the faces, to assess attentional orienting. When shown negative-neutral pairs, both age groups were biased to attend to negative faces, but when shown positive-negative pairs only younger adults showed a bias toward negative; older adults showed a lack of orienting toward either emotional face. Results suggest younger adults have a negativity bias in attention orienting regardless of the valence of nearby stimuli, whereas older adults show an absence of this bias when positive information is present.
a Department of Psychology , University of Waterloo , Waterloo , Ontario , Canada.
Jennifer C
JC
Tomaszczyk
Myra A
MA
Fernandes
D000293:Adolescent; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D004644:Emotions; D005145:Face; D005149:Facial Expression; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011581:Psychological Tests; D011930:Reaction Time; D014796:Visual Perception; D055815:Young Adult
Aging; Dot probe; Emotion; Faces; Positivity effect; Selective attention