Control of valence-based disturbances of information processing

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Stimuli that are spontaneously evaluated as either very negative or positive can disturb cognitive tasks. This is the case, for example, when a car wreck or an attractive advertising signs detracts a car driver form keeping track of the road. Humans are normally quite successful in accomplishing such tasks despite valence-based disturbances. The project aims to study those mechanisms that enable us to regulate the extent of such disturbances. Such processes can be recruited in a reactive manner, as response to experienced disturbance, or in a proactive manner when of disturbances are expected. Based on the work of the previous funding period, we aim to scrutinize the boundary conditions of reactive regulation of valence-based disturbance and the relationship to the regulation of other types of task disturbance (e.g. spatial interference). In the second we aim to scrutinize e the conditions of proactive regulation and its relationship to the proactive regulation of other types of task disturbances. The project will thus reveal, if and under which conditions, valence-based disturbances are regulated in a domain-specific or domain-unspecific manner.