How Positive Affect Modulates Cognitive Control: Reduced Perseveration at the Cost of Increased Distractibility

• Published in: Journal of experimental psychology. Learning, memory, and cognition Vol. 30; no. 2; pp. 343 - 353
• Main Authors: Dreisbach, Gesine, Goschke, Thomas
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Psychological Association 01.03.2004
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Affect - physiology; Affective Behavior; Attention - physiology; Behavior Disorders; Brain; Cognitive Processes; Color Perception - physiology; Discrimination Learning - physiology; Dopamine - physiology; Female; Frontal Lobe - physiology; Humans; Internal-External Control; Male; Motivation; Pattern Recognition, Visual; Problem Solving - physiology; Psychological Studies; Reaction Time - physiology; Set (Psychology)

A fundamental problem that organisms face in a changing environment is how to regulate dynamically the balance between stable maintenance and flexible switching of goals and cognitive sets. The authors show that positive affect plays an important role in the regulation of this stability-flexibility...