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Trait Anxiety and Attention: Cognitive Functioning as a Function of Attentional Demands

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Abstract

This study examined the relationship between trait anxiety and cognitive functioning, specifically response inhibition and conflict resolution, by comparing attention switching and sustained attention conditions in a dichotic-listening to words task. Results showed that high- as compared to low-anxiety participants had a lower hit rate in both attention conditions, a lower intrusion rate in the sustained attention condition, and greater difficulty shifting attention in the mixed condition. Furthermore, laterality-related findings revealed that high-anxiety participants had a lower hit rate when attention was directed to the left-ear (right hemisphere) and less intrusions when attention was directed right-ear (left hemisphere) than did the low-anxiety participants. The findings are interpreted based on attentional control and load theories as well as on the attentional model of hemisphere asymmetry, supporting the proposition that high anxiety is associated with an imbalance between bottom-up and top-down processes, and that anxiety may affect cognitive control under high cognitive load conditions.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by an EU Marie-Curie International Fellowship PIOF-GA-2009-236183 to Rotem Leshem.

This study was conducted while the author was a post-doc fellow in Eran Zaidel’s Cognitive Neuroscience lab, in the Psychology Department at UCLA. I wish to thank him deeply for his mentorship and support, especially in the conceptualization of this study.

Funding

This study was funded by EU Marie-Curie International Fellowship (PIOF-GA-2009-236183).

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  1. Department of Criminology, Bar-Ilan University, 5290002, Ramat Gan, Israel

    Rotem Leshem

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Correspondence to Rotem Leshem.

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All procedures performed in this study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in this study.

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The author, Dr. Rotem Leshem declares that she has no conflict of interest.

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Leshem, R. Trait Anxiety and Attention: Cognitive Functioning as a Function of Attentional Demands. Curr Psychol 39, 1830–1842 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-018-9884-9

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