Emotionally-salient stimuli receive attentional priority. Here, we tested the extent to which top-down control can modulate this prioritization within the domain of temporal attention. To test this prioritization, we measured emotion-induced blindness, which is the effect whereby the perception of a target is impaired by the presentation of a negative distractor that precedes the target in a rapid serial visual presentation stream, relative to target perception following a neutral distractor. The degree of top-down control was investigated by manipulating participants' concurrent working memory load while performing the task. The working-memory load consisted of participants performing mathematical calculations (no load = no calculation; low load = adding two numbers; and high load = adding and subtracting four numbers). Results indicated that the magnitude of emotion-induced blindness was not affected by the working-memory load. This finding, when combined with those of previous studies, supports the notion that the prioritization of emotionally-salient stimuli in the temporal allocation of attention does not require top-down processing, while it does in the spatial allocation of attention.
Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s42761-022-00176-9.
Keywords: Attention; Cognitive control; Distraction; Emotion; Emotion-induced blindness; Top-down attention.
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