Perception of Danger Signals: The Role of Control
Abstract
Abstract. How does the perceptual system process stimuli that signal aversive outcomes or dangers? Considering the functional links between perception, attention, and action regulation, we posit that when people can avoid the aversive consequences, sensitivity of the perceptual system to danger signals should be enhanced, whereas it should be reduced when there is no such option. To test this prediction, we used a search task in which tachistoscopically presented conjunctions of features had to be detected. Parameters of sensitivity and response bias were analyzed drawing on procedures from signal detection theory. Although the experimental procedure rewarded correct responses, the predicted asymmetry emerged. For stimuli that were linked to a negative consequence (loss of points in the experimental game), perceptual sensitivity was enhanced when participants had the opportunity to neutralize the loss in a second task; an opposite pattern emerged when they had no such opportunity.
References
(1987). Selection for action: Some behavioral and neurophysiological considerations of attention and action. In H. Heuer & A. F. Sanders (Eds.), Perspectives on perception and action (pp. 395-419). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
(1993). Attention and control: Have we been asking the wrong questions?. A critical review of twenty-five years. In D. E. Meyer & S. Kornblum (Eds.), Attention and performance 14: Synergies in experimental psychology, artificial intelligence, and cognitive neuroscience (pp. 183-218). Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
(2000). What I do know won’t hurt me: Optimism, attention to negative information, coping, and health. In J. E. Gillham (Ed.), The science of optimism and hope: Research essays in honor of Martin E. P. Seligman. (pp. 163-200). Philadelphia, PA: Templeton Foundation Press.
(1977). The influence of response effectiveness on the preference for warning and on psychophysiological stress reactions. Journal of Personality, 45, 395– 418
(1972). Vigilant and nonvigilant coping strategies and psychophysiological stress reactions during the anticipation of electric shock. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 23, 128– 141
(1994). Overriding stimulus-driven attentional capture. Perception and Psychophysics, 55, 485– 496
(1997). Goal-directed guidance of attention: Evidence from conjunctive visual search. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 23, 948– 961
(1970). The preference-for-signaled-shock phenomenon: Signalling shock is reinforcing only if shock is modifiable. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 22, 681– 685
(1973). Preference-for-signaled-shock phenomenon: Effects of shock modifiability and light reinforcement. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 100, 380– 386
(1999). Sources of resilience in the aging self: Toward integrating perspectives. In T. M. Hess & F. Blanchard-Fields (Eds.), Social cognition and aging (pp. 123-141). New York: Academic Press.
(1994). The aging self: Stabilizing and protective processes. Developmental Review, 14, 52– 80
(1990). Tenacious goal pursuit and flexible goal adjustment: Explication and age-related analysis of assimilative and accommodative strategies of coping. Psychology and Aging, 5, 58– 67
(2002a). Intentional self development: Exploring the interfaces between development, intentionality, and the self. In L. J. Crockett (Ed.), Motivation, agency, and the life course (Nebraska Symposium on Motivation 47, pp. 31-75). Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.
(2002b). The life-course dynamics of goal pursuit and goal adjustment: A two-process framework. Developmental Review, 22, 117– 150
(1999). Intentional self-development through adulthood and later life: Tenacious pursuit and flexible adjustment of goals. In J. Brandtstädter & R. M. Lerner (Eds.), Action and self-development: Theory and research through the life span (pp. 373-400). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
(1957). On perceptual readiness. Psychological Review, 64, 123– 152
(2001). Emotion, attention and the “negativity bias”, studied through event-related potentials. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 41, 75– 85
(1992). Motivated skepticism: Use of differential decision criteria for preferred and nonpreferred conclusions. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63, 568– 584
(1974). A new look at the new look: Perceptual defense and vigilance. Psychological Review, 81, 1– 25
(1958). Unconscious processes. In M. R. Jones (Ed.), Nebraska Symposium on Motivation (Vol. 6, pp. 169-227). Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.
(1992). Involuntary covert orienting is contingent on attentional control settings. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 18, 1030– 1044
(1996). The volitional benefits of planning. In P. M. Gollwitzer & J. A. Bargh (Eds.), The psychology of action: Linking cognition and motivation to behavior (pp. 287-312). New York: Guilford Press.
Eds. (1990). Foundations of social behavior. (Handbook of motivation and cognition: Vol. 2. New York: Guilford Press.
(1953). Ambiguity of pictures and extent of personality factors in fantasy responses. Journal of Consulting Psychology, 17, 283– 288
(1992). Motivated person perception: Constructing justifications for desired beliefs. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 28, 145– 168
(1996). Emotional influences on cognitive processing, with implications for theories of both. In P. M. Gollwitzer & J. A. Bargh (Eds.), The psychology of action: Linking cognition and motivation to behavior (pp. 168-189). New York: Guilford Press.
(1990). The case for motivated reasoning. Psychological Bulletin, 108, 480– 498
(1991). Detection theory: A user’s guide. New York: Cambridge University Press.
(1986). Stressor controllability and stress-induced analgesia. In D. D. Kelly (Ed.), Stress-induced analgesia (Vol. 467, pp. 55-72). New York: New York Academy of Sciences.
(1949). Emotionality and perceptual defense. Psychological Review, 56, 244– 251
(1952). Perceptual defense in normal and in schizophrenic observers. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 47, 833– 837
(1979). Coping with impending stress: Psychophysiological and cognitive correlates of choice. Psychophysiology, 16, 572– 581
(1987). Monitoring and blunting: Validation of a questionnaire to assess styles of information seeking under threat. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 345– 353
(1943). Thematic apperception test. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
(1990). Positive-negative asymmetry in evaluations: The distinction between affective and informational negativity effects. In W. Stroebe & M. Hewstone (Eds.), European Review of Social Psychology (Vol. 1, pp. 33-60). Chichester, UK: Wiley.
(1948). Personal values as selective factors in perception. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 43, 142– 154
(1991). Automatic vigilance: The attention-grabbing power of negative social information. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 61, 380– 391
(1954). The effect of shock on recognition thresholds. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 49, 165– 172
(1995). Cognitive processing of personally relevant information. Cognition and Emotion, 9, 325– 340
(1954). Change in perceptual threshold as a protective function of the organism. Journal of Personality, 23, 182– 194
(1972). Attention and responsivity to remote dangers: A laboratory simulation for assessing reactions to threatening events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 24, 132– 142
(2002). Nociceptive sensitivity and control: Hypo- and hyperalgesia under two different modes of coping. Experimental Psychology, 49, 57– 66
(2001). Automatic attention to stimuli signaling chances and dangers: Moderating effects of positive and negative goal and action contexts. Cognition and Emotion, 15, 231– 248
(1988). Pragmatics of measuring recognition memory: Applications to dementia and amnesia. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 117, 34– 50
Eds. (1986). Foundations of social behavior. (Handbook of motivation and cognition: Vol. 1. New York: Guilford Press.
Eds. (1996). The interpersonal context. (Handbook of motivation and cognition: Vol. 3. New York: Guilford Press.
(1988). Illusion and well-being: A social psychological perspective on mental health. Psychological Bulletin, 103, 193– 210
(1992). Selection for action: The role of inhibitory mechanisms. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 2, 105– 109
(1994). Behavioural goals determine inhibitory mechanisms of selective attention. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 47A, 809– 840
(1999). Feature binding, attention, and object perception. In G. W. Humphreys, J. Duncan, & A. Treisman (Eds.), Attention, space, and action. Studies in cognitive neuroscience (pp. 91-111). New York: Oxford University Press.
(2000). Automatic vigilance: The attention-grabbing power of approach- and avoidance-related social information. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78, 1024– 1037
(2002). Binding in short-term visual memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 131, 48– 64
(1989). Guided search: An alternative to the feature integration model for visual search. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 15, 419– 433
