title: Influence of attention on bimodal integration during emotional change decoding: ERP evidence.
abstract: Recent findings on audiovisual emotional interactions suggest that selective attention affects cross-sensory interaction from an early processing stage. However, the influence of attention manipulation on facial-vocal integration during emotional change perception is still elusive at this point. To address this issue, we asked participants to detect emotional changes conveyed by prosodies (vocal task) or facial expressions (facial task) while facial, vocal, and facial-vocal expressions were presented. At the same time, behavioral responses and electroencephalogram (EEG) were recorded. Behavioral results showed that bimodal emotional changes were detected with shorter response latencies compared to each unimodal condition, suggesting that bimodal emotional cues facilitated emotional change detection. Moreover, while the P3 amplitudes were larger for the bimodal change condition than for the sum of the two unimodal conditions regardless of attention direction, the N1 amplitudes were larger for the bimodal emotional change condition than for the sum of the two unimodal conditions under the attend-voice condition, but not under the attend-face condition. These findings suggest that selective attention modulates facial-vocal integration during emotional change perception in early sensory processing, but not in late cognitive processing stages.
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Behavior and Cognitive Psychology in Shaanxi Province, School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an 710062, China; Key Laboratory of Modern Teaching Technology, Ministry of Education, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an 710062, China. Electronic address: shiningocean@snnu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Xuhai
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Behavior and Cognitive Psychology in Shaanxi Province, School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an 710062, China.
authors.forename: Lingzi
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Han
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Behavior and Cognitive Psychology in Shaanxi Province, School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an 710062, China.
authors.forename: Zhihui
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Pan
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Behavior and Cognitive Psychology in Shaanxi Province, School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an 710062, China.
authors.forename: Yangmei
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Luo
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Behavior and Cognitive Psychology in Shaanxi Province, School of Psychology, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an 710062, China. Electronic address: shuxing166@163.com.
authors.forename: Ping
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Wang
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D004569:Electroencephalography; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005071:Evoked Potentials / Q000502:physiology*; D005149:Facial Expression; D000066499:Facial Recognition / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D013067:Speech Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Attention; Bimodal integration; Emotional change; Event related potential