Personality and augmenting/reducing (A/R) in auditory event-related potentials (ERPs) during emotional visual stimulation

摘要

An auditory augmenting/reducing ERP paradigm recorded for 5 intensity tones with emotional visual\udstimulation was used, for the first time, to test predictions derived from the revised Reinforcement\udSensitivity Theory (rRST) of personality with respect to two major factors: behavioral inhibition system\ud(BIS), fight/flight/freeze system (FFFS). Higher BIS and FFFS scores were negatively correlated with N1/\udP2 slopes at central sites (C3, Cz, C4). Conditional process analysis revealed that the BIS was a mediator\udof the association between the N1/P2 slope and the FFFS scores. An analysis of covariance showed that\udlower BIS scorers exhibited larger N1/P2 amplitudes across all tone intensities while watching negative,\udpositive and neutral pictures. Additionally, lower FFFS scorers compared to higher FFFS scorers\uddisclosed larger N1/P2 amplitudes to the highest tone intensities and these differences were even\udmore pronounced while watching positive emotional pictures. Findings were explained assuming the\udoperation of two different, but related processes: transmarginal inhibition for the BIS; the attention/\udemotional gating mechanism regulating cortical sensory input for the FFFS trait. These findings appear\udconsistent with predictions derived from the rRST, which traced fear and anxiety to separate but\udinteracting neurobehavioural systems.