title: Eye movement during retrieval of emotional autobiographical memories.
abstract: This study assessed whether specific eye movement patterns are observed during emotional autobiographical retrieval. Participants were asked to retrieve positive, negative and neutral memories while their scan path was recorded by an eye-tracker. Results showed that positive and negative emotional memories triggered more fixations and saccades but shorter fixation duration than neutral memories. No significant differences were observed between emotional and neutral memories for duration and amplitude of saccades. Positive and negative retrieval triggered similar eye movement (i.e., similar number of fixations and saccades, fixation duration, duration of saccades, and amplitude of saccades). Interestingly, the participants reported higher visual imagery for emotional memories than for neutral memories. The findings demonstrate similarities and differences in eye movement during retrieval of neutral and emotional memories. Eye movement during autobiographical retrieval seems to be triggered by the creation of visual mental images as the latter are indexed by autobiographical reconstruction.
authors.affiliation: Univ. Lille, CNRS, CHU Lille, UMR 9193, SCALab, Sciences Cognitives et, Sciences Affectives, F-59000 Lille, France. Electronic address: el.haj@hotmail.fr.
authors.forename: Mohamad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: El Haj
authors.affiliation: Univ. Lille, CNRS, CHU Lille, UMR 9193, SCALab, Sciences Cognitives et, Sciences Affectives, F-59000 Lille, France.
authors.forename: Jean-Louis
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Nandrino
authors.affiliation: Univ. Lille, CNRS, CHU Lille, UMR 9193, SCALab, Sciences Cognitives et, Sciences Affectives, F-59000 Lille, France.
authors.forename: Pascal
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Antoine
authors.affiliation: Univ. Lille, CNRS, CHU Lille, UMR 9193, SCALab, Sciences Cognitives et, Sciences Affectives, F-59000 Lille, France.
authors.forename: Muriel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Boucart
authors.affiliation: Univ. Lille, CNRS, CHU Lille, UMR 9193, SCALab, Sciences Cognitives et, Sciences Affectives, F-59000 Lille, France.
authors.forename: Quentin
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Lenoble
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D005403:Fixation, Ocular / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D061212:Memory, Episodic; D011939:Mental Recall; D012438:Saccades / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Autobiographical memory; Emotion; Eye movement; Fixations; Saccades