Description
Threatening stimuli receive a preferential allocation of attention, a phenomenon termed an attentional bias to threat. Previous research has shown that exposure to prolonged unpredictable threats can induce a state of anxiety, which alters key aspects of physiology, cognition, and behavior. The present study investigated whether threat-induced anxiety modulates the allocation of attention to threat by examining behavioral and neural measures of attentional bias to threat under safe and threat-of-shock conditions. Moreover, we examined whether an individual’s level of trait anxiety plays a role in the effect of threat- induced anxiety on attention. We found that state anxiety was not able to modulate attentional bias to threat through both behavioral and ERP measures. Additionally, we found that the relationship between state anxiety and attentional bias to threat was not dependent on trait anxiety levels. These findings indicate that attentional bias to threat, when tested using the dot-probe paradigm, does not interact with state and trait anxiety. Keywords: attentional bias, N2pc, dot probe, IAPS, ERPs, threat, anxiety, reaction time, threat of shock
