Mara Mather | University of Southern California (original) (raw)

Papers by Mara Mather

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, Jan 4, 2018

Recent models posit that bursts of locus coeruleus (LC) activity amplify neural gain, such that l... more Recent models posit that bursts of locus coeruleus (LC) activity amplify neural gain, such that limited attention and encoding resources focus even more on prioritized mental representations under arousal. Here, we tested this hypothesis in human males and females using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), neuromelanin MRI, and pupil dilation, a biomarker of arousal and LC activity. During scanning, participants performed a monetary incentive encoding task in which threat of punishment motivated participants to prioritize encoding of scene images over superimposed objects. Threat of punishment elicited arousal and selectively enhanced memory for goal-relevant scenes. Furthermore, trial-level pupil dilations predicted better scene memory under threat, but were not related to object memory outcomes. FMRI analyses revealed that greater threat-evoked pupil dilations were positively associated with greater scene encoding activity in LC and parahippocampal cortex, a region specia...

The Behavioral and brain sciences, 2016

The GANE (glutamate amplifies noradrenergic effects) model proposes that local glutamate-norepine... more The GANE (glutamate amplifies noradrenergic effects) model proposes that local glutamate-norepinephrine interactions enable "winner-take-more" effects in perception and memory under arousal. A diverse range of commentaries addressed both the nature of this "hotspot" feedback mechanism and its implications in a variety of psychological domains, inspiring exciting avenues for future research.

Psychoneuroendocrinology, 2017

Recent findings indicate that emotional arousal can enhance memory consolidation of goal-relevant... more Recent findings indicate that emotional arousal can enhance memory consolidation of goal-relevant stimuli while impairing it for irrelevant stimuli. According to one recent model, these goal-dependent memory tradeoffs are driven by arousal-induced release of norepinephrine (NE), which amplifies neural gain in target sensory and memory processing brain regions. Past work also shows that ovarian hormones modulate activity in the same regions thought to support NE's effects on memory, such as the amygdala, suggesting that men and women may be differentially susceptible to arousal's dual effects on episodic memory. Here, we aimed to determine the neurohormonal mechanisms that mediate arousal-biased competition processes in memory. In a competitive visuo-attention task, participants viewed images of a transparent object overlaid on a background scene and explicitly memorized one of these stimuli while ignoring the other. Participants then heard emotional or neutral audio-clips an...

Neurobiology of aging, 2017

Correlations in activity across disparate brain regions during rest reveal functional networks in... more Correlations in activity across disparate brain regions during rest reveal functional networks in the brain. Although previous studies largely agree that there is an age-related decline in the "default mode network," how age affects other resting-state networks, such as emotion-related networks, is still controversial. Here we used a dual-regression approach to investigate age-related alterations in resting-state networks. The results revealed age-related disruptions in functional connectivity in all 5 identified cognitive networks, namely the default mode network, cognitive-auditory, cognitive-speech (or speech-related somatosensory), and right and left frontoparietal networks, whereas such age effects were not observed in the 3 identified emotion networks. In addition, we observed age-related decline in functional connectivity in 3 visual and 3 motor/visuospatial networks. Older adults showed greater functional connectivity in regions outside 4 out of the 5 identified co...

Memory & Cognition, 2017

Although a group of people working together recalls more items than any one individual, they reca... more Although a group of people working together recalls more items than any one individual, they recall fewer unique items than the same number of people working apart whose responses are combined. This is known as collaborative inhibition, and it is a robust effect that occurs for both younger and older adults. However, almost all previous studies documenting collaborative inhibition have used stimuli that were neutral in emotional valence, low in arousal, and studied by all group members. In the current experiments, we tested the impact of picture-stimuli valence, picture-stimuli arousal, and information distribution in modulating the magnitude of collaborative inhibition. We included both younger and older adults because there are age differences in how people remember emotional pictures that could modulate any effects of emotion on collaborative inhibition. Results revealed that when information was shared (i.e., studied by all group members), there were robust collaborative inhibition effects for both neutral and emotional stimuli for both younger and older adults. However, when information was unshared (i.e., studied by only a single group member), these effects were attenuated. Together, these results provide mixed support for the retrieval strategy disruption account of collaborative inhibition. Supporting the retrieval strategy disruption account, unshared study information was less susceptible to collaborative inhibition than shared study information. Contradicting the retrieval strategy disruption account, emotional valence and arousal did not modulate the magnitude of collaborative inhibition despite the fact that participants clustered the emotional, but not neutral, information together in memory.

Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, 2016

Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, 2016

Arousal's selective effects on cognition go beyond the simple enhancement of emotional stimuli, s... more Arousal's selective effects on cognition go beyond the simple enhancement of emotional stimuli, sometimes enhancing and other times impairing processing of proximal neutral information. Past work shows that arousal impairs encoding of subsequent neutral stimuli regardless of their top-down priority via the engagement of β-adrenoreceptors. In contrast, retrograde amnesia induced by emotional arousal can flip to enhancement when preceding neutral items are prioritized in top-down attention. Whether β-adrenoreceptors also contribute to this retrograde memory enhancement of goal-relevant neutral stimuli is unclear. In this pharmacological study, we administered 40mg of propranolol or 40mg of placebo to healthy young adults to examine whether emotional arousal's bidirectional effects on declarative memory relies on β-adrenoreceptor activation. Following pill intake, participants completed an emotional oddball task in which they were asked to prioritize a neutral object appearing just before an emotional or neutral oddball image within a sequence of 7 neutral objects. Under placebo, emotional oddballs impaired memory for lower priority oddball+1 objects but had no effect on memory for high priority oddball-1 objects. Propranolol blocked this anterograde amnesic effect of arousal. Emotional oddballs also enhanced selective memory trade-offs significantly more in the placebo than drug condition, such that high priority oddball-1 objects were more likely to be remembered at the cost of their corresponding lower priority oddball+1 objects under arousal. Lastly, those who recalled more high priority oddball-1 objects preceding an emotional versus neutral oddball image showed greater increases in salivary alpha-amylase, a biomarker of noradrenergic system activation, across the task. Together these findings suggest that different noradrenergic mechanisms contribute to the anterograde and retrograde mnemonic effects of arousal on proximal neutral memoranda.

Memory & Cognition, 2016

Compared with younger adults, older adults have a relative preference to attend to and remember p... more Compared with younger adults, older adults have a relative preference to attend to and remember positive over negative information. This is known as the "positivity effect," and researchers have typically evoked socioemotional selectivity theory to explain it. According to socioemotional selectivity theory, as people get older they begin to perceive their time left in life as more limited. These reduced time horizons prompt older adults to prioritize achieving emotional gratification and thus exhibit increased positivity in attention and recall. Although this is the most commonly cited explanation of the positivity effect, there is currently a lack of clear experimental evidence demonstrating a link between time horizons and positivity. The goal of the current research was to address this issue. In two separate experiments, we asked participants to complete a writing activity, which directed them to think of time as being either limited or expansive (Experiments 1 and 2) or did not orient them to think about time in a particular manner (Experiment 2). Participants were then shown a series of emotional pictures, which they subsequently tried to recall. Results from both studies showed that regardless of chronological age, thinking about a limited future enhanced the relative positivity of participants' recall. Furthermore, the results of Experiment 2 showed that this effect was not driven by changes in mood. Thus, the fact that older adults' recall is typically more positive than younger adults' recall may index naturally shifting time horizons and goals with age.

The journals of gerontology. Series B, Psychological sciences and social sciences, Jan 24, 2016

Previous research demonstrates that younger and older adults prefer distraction over engagement (... more Previous research demonstrates that younger and older adults prefer distraction over engagement (reappraisal) when regulating high-intensity negative emotion. Older adults also demonstrate a greater bias for positive over negative information in attention and memory compared with younger adults. In this study, we investigated whether emotion regulation choice preferences may differ as a function of stimulus valence with age. The effect of stimulus intensity on negative and positive emotion regulation strategy preferences was investigated in younger and older men. Participants indicated whether they favored distraction or reappraisal to attenuate emotional reactions to negative and positive images that varied in intensity. Men in both age-groups preferred distraction over reappraisal when regulating high-intensity emotion. As no age-related strategic differences were found in negative emotion regulation preferences, older men chose to distract less from high-intensity positive images...

NeuroImage, Jan 31, 2016

The ability to regulate emotion is crucial to promote well-being. Evidence suggests that the medi... more The ability to regulate emotion is crucial to promote well-being. Evidence suggests that the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and adjacent anterior cingulate (ACC) modulate amygdala activity during emotion regulation. Yet less is known about whether the amygdala-mPFC circuit is linked with regulation of the autonomic nervous system and whether the relationship differs across the adult lifespan. The current study tested the hypothesis that heart rate variability (HRV) reflects the strength of mPFC-amygdala interaction across younger and older adults. We recorded participants' heart rates at baseline and examined whether baseline HRV was associated with amygdala-mPFC functional connectivity during rest. We found that higher HRV was associated with stronger functional connectivity between the amygdala and the mPFC during rest across younger and older adults. In addition to this age-invariant pattern, there was an age-related change, such that greater HRV was linked with stronger fun...

Journal of experimental psychology. General, Jan 9, 2015

Within a week of the attack of September 11, 2001, a consortium of researchers from across the Un... more Within a week of the attack of September 11, 2001, a consortium of researchers from across the United States distributed a survey asking about the circumstances in which respondents learned of the attack (their flashbulb memories) and the facts about the attack itself (their event memories). Follow-up surveys were distributed 11, 25, and 119 months after the attack. The study, therefore, examines retention of flashbulb memories and event memories at a substantially longer retention interval than any previous study using a test-retest methodology, allowing for the study of such memories over the long term. There was rapid forgetting of both flashbulb and event memories within the first year, but the forgetting curves leveled off after that, not significantly changing even after a 10-year delay. Despite the initial rapid forgetting, confidence remained high throughout the 10-year period. Five putative factors affecting flashbulb memory consistency and event memory accuracy were examin...

Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology (Neuropsychology, Development and Cognition: Section A), 2000

To examine the contribution of visual-perceptual and visual-organizational factors to visual memo... more To examine the contribution of visual-perceptual and visual-organizational factors to visual memory in amnesia, Korsakoff, medial temporal, and anterior communicating artery (ACoA) aneurysm amnesics' copy, organization, and recall performance on the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure was assessed. Korsakoff patients were matched to medial temporal patients in terms of severity of amnesia, while the ACoA group, which was less severely amnesic, was matched to the Korsakoff patients on performance on executive tasks. Results indicated that while both the ACoA and Korsakoff groups had poorer copy accuracy and organization than controls, only the Korsakoff patients' copy accuracy was worse than the other two amnesic groups. While the Korsakoff patient's visuoperceptual deficits could partially explain this group's poor performance at immediate recall, the Korsakoff group's comparatively worse performance at delayed recall could not be accounted for by poor copy accuracy, reduced visual organization, or even the combined influence of these two factors.

Brain Sciences, 2016

Anxiety is associated with an exaggerated expectancy of harm, including overestimation of how lik... more Anxiety is associated with an exaggerated expectancy of harm, including overestimation of how likely a conditioned stimulus (CS+) predicts a harmful unconditioned stimulus (US). In the current study we tested whether anxiety-associated expectancy of harm increases primary sensory cortex (S1) activity on non-reinforced (i.e., no shock) CS+ trials. Twenty healthy volunteers completed a differential-tone trace conditioning task while undergoing fMRI, with shock delivered to the left hand. We found a positive correlation between trait anxiety and activity in right, but not left, S1 during CS+ versus CS- conditions. Right S1 activity also correlated with individual differences in both primary auditory cortices (A1) and amygdala activity. Lastly, a seed-based functional connectivity analysis demonstrated that trial-wise S1 activity was positively correlated with regions of dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC), suggesting that higher-order cognitive processes contribute to the anticipatory sensory reactivity. Our findings indicate that individual differences in trait anxiety relate to anticipatory reactivity for the US during associative learning. This anticipatory reactivity is also integrated along with emotion-related sensory signals into a brain network implicated in fear-conditioned responding.

Annual Review of Psychology, 2016

Although aging is associated with clear declines in physical and cognitive processes, emotional f... more Although aging is associated with clear declines in physical and cognitive processes, emotional functioning fares relatively well. Consistent with this behavioral profile, two core emotional brain regions, the amygdala and ventromedial prefrontal cortex, show little structural and functional decline in aging, compared with other regions. However, emotional processes depend on interacting systems of neurotransmitters and brain regions that go beyond these structures. This review examines how age-related brain changes influence processes such as attending to and remembering emotional stimuli, regulating emotion, and recognizing emotional expressions, as well as empathy, risk taking, impulsivity, behavior change, and attentional focus.

Http Dx Doi Org 10 1162 Jocn_A_00392, Mar 26, 2013

As people get older, they tend to remember more positive than negative information. This age-by-v... more As people get older, they tend to remember more positive than negative information. This age-by-valence interaction has been called "positivity effect." The current study addressed the hypotheses that baseline functional connectivity at rest is predictive of older adults' brain activity when learning emotional information and their positivity effect in memory. Using fMRI, we examined the relationship among resting-state functional connectivity, subsequent brain activity when learning emotional faces, and individual differences in the positivity effect (the relative tendency to remember faces expressing positive vs. negative emotions). Consistent with our hypothesis, older adults with a stronger positivity effect had increased functional coupling between amygdala and medial PFC (MPFC) during rest. In contrast, younger adults did not show the association between resting connectivity and memory positivity. A similar age-by-memory positivity interaction was also found when learning emotional faces. That is, memory positivity in older adults was associated with (a) enhanced MPFC activity when learning emotional faces and (b) increased negative functional coupling between amygdala and MPFC when learning negative faces. In contrast, memory positivity in younger adults was related to neither enhanced MPFC activity to emotional faces, nor MPFC-amygdala connectivity to negative faces. Furthermore, stronger MPFC-amygdala connectivity during rest was predictive of subsequent greater MPFC activity when learning emotional faces. Thus, emotion-memory interaction in older adults depends not only on the task-related brain activity but also on the baseline functional connectivity.

How can functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) advance cognitive theory? Some have argued t... more How can functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) advance cognitive theory? Some have argued that fMRI can do little beyond localizing brain regions that carry out certain cognitive functions (and may not even be able to do that). However, in this article, we argue that fMRI can inform theories of cognition by helping to answer at least four distinct kinds of questions. Which mental functions are performed in brain regions specialized for just that function (and which are performed in more generalpurpose brain machinery)? When fMRI markers of a particular Mental Process X are found, is Mental Process X engaged when people perform Task Y? How distinct are the representations of different stimulus classes? Do specific pairs of tasks engage common or distinct processing mechanisms? Thus, fMRI data can be used to address theoretical debates that have nothing to do with where in the brain a particular process is carried out.

Psychological Science

Negative stereotypes about aging can impair older adults' memory via stereotype threat; howev... more Negative stereotypes about aging can impair older adults' memory via stereotype threat; however, the mechanisms underlying this phenomenon are unclear. In two experiments, we tested competing predictions derived from two theoretical accounts of stereotype threat: executive-control interference and regulatory fit. Older adults completed a working memory test either under stereotype threat about age-related memory declines or not under such threat. Monetary incentives were manipulated such that recall led to gains or forgetting led to losses. The executive-control-interference account predicts that stereotype threat decreases the availability of executive-control resources and hence should impair working memory performance. The regulatory-fit account predicts that threat induces a prevention focus, which should impair performance when gains are emphasized but improve performance when losses are emphasized. Results were consistent only with the regulatory-fit account. Although ster...

Quarterly journal of experimental psychology (2006)

Stereotype threat often incurs the cost of reducing the amount of information that older adults a... more Stereotype threat often incurs the cost of reducing the amount of information that older adults accurately recall. In the current research, we tested whether stereotype threat can also benefit memory. According to the regulatory focus account of stereotype threat, threat induces a prevention focus in which people become concerned with avoiding errors of commission and are sensitive to the presence or absence of losses within their environment. Because of this, we predicted that stereotype threat might reduce older adults' memory errors. Results were consistent with this prediction. Older adults under stereotype threat had lower intrusion rates during free-recall tests (Experiments 1 and 2). They also reduced their false alarms and adopted more conservative response criteria during a recognition test (Experiment 2). Thus, stereotype threat can decrease older adults' false memories, albeit at the cost of fewer veridical memories, as well.

Recent years have seen a rejuvenation of interest in studies of motivation-cognition interactions... more Recent years have seen a rejuvenation of interest in studies of motivation-cognition interactions arising from many different areas of psychology and neuroscience. The present issue of Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience provides a sampling of some of the latest research from a number of these different areas. In this introductory article, we provide an overview of the current state of the field, in terms of key research developments and candidate neural mechanisms receiving focused investigation as potential sources of motivation-cognition interaction. However, our primary goal is conceptual: to highlight the distinct perspectives taken by different research areas, in terms of how motivation is defined, the relevant dimensions and dissociations that are emphasized, and the theoretical questions being targeted. Together, these distinctions present both challenges and opportunities for efforts aiming toward a more unified and cross-disciplinary approach. We identify a set of pressing research questions calling for this sort of cross-disciplinary approach, with the explicit goal of encouraging integrative and collaborative investigations directed toward them.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, Jan 4, 2018

Recent models posit that bursts of locus coeruleus (LC) activity amplify neural gain, such that l... more Recent models posit that bursts of locus coeruleus (LC) activity amplify neural gain, such that limited attention and encoding resources focus even more on prioritized mental representations under arousal. Here, we tested this hypothesis in human males and females using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), neuromelanin MRI, and pupil dilation, a biomarker of arousal and LC activity. During scanning, participants performed a monetary incentive encoding task in which threat of punishment motivated participants to prioritize encoding of scene images over superimposed objects. Threat of punishment elicited arousal and selectively enhanced memory for goal-relevant scenes. Furthermore, trial-level pupil dilations predicted better scene memory under threat, but were not related to object memory outcomes. FMRI analyses revealed that greater threat-evoked pupil dilations were positively associated with greater scene encoding activity in LC and parahippocampal cortex, a region specia...

The Behavioral and brain sciences, 2016

The GANE (glutamate amplifies noradrenergic effects) model proposes that local glutamate-norepine... more The GANE (glutamate amplifies noradrenergic effects) model proposes that local glutamate-norepinephrine interactions enable "winner-take-more" effects in perception and memory under arousal. A diverse range of commentaries addressed both the nature of this "hotspot" feedback mechanism and its implications in a variety of psychological domains, inspiring exciting avenues for future research.

Psychoneuroendocrinology, 2017

Recent findings indicate that emotional arousal can enhance memory consolidation of goal-relevant... more Recent findings indicate that emotional arousal can enhance memory consolidation of goal-relevant stimuli while impairing it for irrelevant stimuli. According to one recent model, these goal-dependent memory tradeoffs are driven by arousal-induced release of norepinephrine (NE), which amplifies neural gain in target sensory and memory processing brain regions. Past work also shows that ovarian hormones modulate activity in the same regions thought to support NE's effects on memory, such as the amygdala, suggesting that men and women may be differentially susceptible to arousal's dual effects on episodic memory. Here, we aimed to determine the neurohormonal mechanisms that mediate arousal-biased competition processes in memory. In a competitive visuo-attention task, participants viewed images of a transparent object overlaid on a background scene and explicitly memorized one of these stimuli while ignoring the other. Participants then heard emotional or neutral audio-clips an...

Neurobiology of aging, 2017

Correlations in activity across disparate brain regions during rest reveal functional networks in... more Correlations in activity across disparate brain regions during rest reveal functional networks in the brain. Although previous studies largely agree that there is an age-related decline in the "default mode network," how age affects other resting-state networks, such as emotion-related networks, is still controversial. Here we used a dual-regression approach to investigate age-related alterations in resting-state networks. The results revealed age-related disruptions in functional connectivity in all 5 identified cognitive networks, namely the default mode network, cognitive-auditory, cognitive-speech (or speech-related somatosensory), and right and left frontoparietal networks, whereas such age effects were not observed in the 3 identified emotion networks. In addition, we observed age-related decline in functional connectivity in 3 visual and 3 motor/visuospatial networks. Older adults showed greater functional connectivity in regions outside 4 out of the 5 identified co...

Memory & Cognition, 2017

Although a group of people working together recalls more items than any one individual, they reca... more Although a group of people working together recalls more items than any one individual, they recall fewer unique items than the same number of people working apart whose responses are combined. This is known as collaborative inhibition, and it is a robust effect that occurs for both younger and older adults. However, almost all previous studies documenting collaborative inhibition have used stimuli that were neutral in emotional valence, low in arousal, and studied by all group members. In the current experiments, we tested the impact of picture-stimuli valence, picture-stimuli arousal, and information distribution in modulating the magnitude of collaborative inhibition. We included both younger and older adults because there are age differences in how people remember emotional pictures that could modulate any effects of emotion on collaborative inhibition. Results revealed that when information was shared (i.e., studied by all group members), there were robust collaborative inhibition effects for both neutral and emotional stimuli for both younger and older adults. However, when information was unshared (i.e., studied by only a single group member), these effects were attenuated. Together, these results provide mixed support for the retrieval strategy disruption account of collaborative inhibition. Supporting the retrieval strategy disruption account, unshared study information was less susceptible to collaborative inhibition than shared study information. Contradicting the retrieval strategy disruption account, emotional valence and arousal did not modulate the magnitude of collaborative inhibition despite the fact that participants clustered the emotional, but not neutral, information together in memory.

Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, 2016

Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, 2016

Arousal's selective effects on cognition go beyond the simple enhancement of emotional stimuli, s... more Arousal's selective effects on cognition go beyond the simple enhancement of emotional stimuli, sometimes enhancing and other times impairing processing of proximal neutral information. Past work shows that arousal impairs encoding of subsequent neutral stimuli regardless of their top-down priority via the engagement of β-adrenoreceptors. In contrast, retrograde amnesia induced by emotional arousal can flip to enhancement when preceding neutral items are prioritized in top-down attention. Whether β-adrenoreceptors also contribute to this retrograde memory enhancement of goal-relevant neutral stimuli is unclear. In this pharmacological study, we administered 40mg of propranolol or 40mg of placebo to healthy young adults to examine whether emotional arousal's bidirectional effects on declarative memory relies on β-adrenoreceptor activation. Following pill intake, participants completed an emotional oddball task in which they were asked to prioritize a neutral object appearing just before an emotional or neutral oddball image within a sequence of 7 neutral objects. Under placebo, emotional oddballs impaired memory for lower priority oddball+1 objects but had no effect on memory for high priority oddball-1 objects. Propranolol blocked this anterograde amnesic effect of arousal. Emotional oddballs also enhanced selective memory trade-offs significantly more in the placebo than drug condition, such that high priority oddball-1 objects were more likely to be remembered at the cost of their corresponding lower priority oddball+1 objects under arousal. Lastly, those who recalled more high priority oddball-1 objects preceding an emotional versus neutral oddball image showed greater increases in salivary alpha-amylase, a biomarker of noradrenergic system activation, across the task. Together these findings suggest that different noradrenergic mechanisms contribute to the anterograde and retrograde mnemonic effects of arousal on proximal neutral memoranda.

Memory & Cognition, 2016

Compared with younger adults, older adults have a relative preference to attend to and remember p... more Compared with younger adults, older adults have a relative preference to attend to and remember positive over negative information. This is known as the "positivity effect," and researchers have typically evoked socioemotional selectivity theory to explain it. According to socioemotional selectivity theory, as people get older they begin to perceive their time left in life as more limited. These reduced time horizons prompt older adults to prioritize achieving emotional gratification and thus exhibit increased positivity in attention and recall. Although this is the most commonly cited explanation of the positivity effect, there is currently a lack of clear experimental evidence demonstrating a link between time horizons and positivity. The goal of the current research was to address this issue. In two separate experiments, we asked participants to complete a writing activity, which directed them to think of time as being either limited or expansive (Experiments 1 and 2) or did not orient them to think about time in a particular manner (Experiment 2). Participants were then shown a series of emotional pictures, which they subsequently tried to recall. Results from both studies showed that regardless of chronological age, thinking about a limited future enhanced the relative positivity of participants' recall. Furthermore, the results of Experiment 2 showed that this effect was not driven by changes in mood. Thus, the fact that older adults' recall is typically more positive than younger adults' recall may index naturally shifting time horizons and goals with age.

The journals of gerontology. Series B, Psychological sciences and social sciences, Jan 24, 2016

Previous research demonstrates that younger and older adults prefer distraction over engagement (... more Previous research demonstrates that younger and older adults prefer distraction over engagement (reappraisal) when regulating high-intensity negative emotion. Older adults also demonstrate a greater bias for positive over negative information in attention and memory compared with younger adults. In this study, we investigated whether emotion regulation choice preferences may differ as a function of stimulus valence with age. The effect of stimulus intensity on negative and positive emotion regulation strategy preferences was investigated in younger and older men. Participants indicated whether they favored distraction or reappraisal to attenuate emotional reactions to negative and positive images that varied in intensity. Men in both age-groups preferred distraction over reappraisal when regulating high-intensity emotion. As no age-related strategic differences were found in negative emotion regulation preferences, older men chose to distract less from high-intensity positive images...

NeuroImage, Jan 31, 2016

The ability to regulate emotion is crucial to promote well-being. Evidence suggests that the medi... more The ability to regulate emotion is crucial to promote well-being. Evidence suggests that the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and adjacent anterior cingulate (ACC) modulate amygdala activity during emotion regulation. Yet less is known about whether the amygdala-mPFC circuit is linked with regulation of the autonomic nervous system and whether the relationship differs across the adult lifespan. The current study tested the hypothesis that heart rate variability (HRV) reflects the strength of mPFC-amygdala interaction across younger and older adults. We recorded participants' heart rates at baseline and examined whether baseline HRV was associated with amygdala-mPFC functional connectivity during rest. We found that higher HRV was associated with stronger functional connectivity between the amygdala and the mPFC during rest across younger and older adults. In addition to this age-invariant pattern, there was an age-related change, such that greater HRV was linked with stronger fun...

Journal of experimental psychology. General, Jan 9, 2015

Within a week of the attack of September 11, 2001, a consortium of researchers from across the Un... more Within a week of the attack of September 11, 2001, a consortium of researchers from across the United States distributed a survey asking about the circumstances in which respondents learned of the attack (their flashbulb memories) and the facts about the attack itself (their event memories). Follow-up surveys were distributed 11, 25, and 119 months after the attack. The study, therefore, examines retention of flashbulb memories and event memories at a substantially longer retention interval than any previous study using a test-retest methodology, allowing for the study of such memories over the long term. There was rapid forgetting of both flashbulb and event memories within the first year, but the forgetting curves leveled off after that, not significantly changing even after a 10-year delay. Despite the initial rapid forgetting, confidence remained high throughout the 10-year period. Five putative factors affecting flashbulb memory consistency and event memory accuracy were examin...

Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology (Neuropsychology, Development and Cognition: Section A), 2000

To examine the contribution of visual-perceptual and visual-organizational factors to visual memo... more To examine the contribution of visual-perceptual and visual-organizational factors to visual memory in amnesia, Korsakoff, medial temporal, and anterior communicating artery (ACoA) aneurysm amnesics' copy, organization, and recall performance on the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure was assessed. Korsakoff patients were matched to medial temporal patients in terms of severity of amnesia, while the ACoA group, which was less severely amnesic, was matched to the Korsakoff patients on performance on executive tasks. Results indicated that while both the ACoA and Korsakoff groups had poorer copy accuracy and organization than controls, only the Korsakoff patients' copy accuracy was worse than the other two amnesic groups. While the Korsakoff patient's visuoperceptual deficits could partially explain this group's poor performance at immediate recall, the Korsakoff group's comparatively worse performance at delayed recall could not be accounted for by poor copy accuracy, reduced visual organization, or even the combined influence of these two factors.

Brain Sciences, 2016

Anxiety is associated with an exaggerated expectancy of harm, including overestimation of how lik... more Anxiety is associated with an exaggerated expectancy of harm, including overestimation of how likely a conditioned stimulus (CS+) predicts a harmful unconditioned stimulus (US). In the current study we tested whether anxiety-associated expectancy of harm increases primary sensory cortex (S1) activity on non-reinforced (i.e., no shock) CS+ trials. Twenty healthy volunteers completed a differential-tone trace conditioning task while undergoing fMRI, with shock delivered to the left hand. We found a positive correlation between trait anxiety and activity in right, but not left, S1 during CS+ versus CS- conditions. Right S1 activity also correlated with individual differences in both primary auditory cortices (A1) and amygdala activity. Lastly, a seed-based functional connectivity analysis demonstrated that trial-wise S1 activity was positively correlated with regions of dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC), suggesting that higher-order cognitive processes contribute to the anticipatory sensory reactivity. Our findings indicate that individual differences in trait anxiety relate to anticipatory reactivity for the US during associative learning. This anticipatory reactivity is also integrated along with emotion-related sensory signals into a brain network implicated in fear-conditioned responding.

Annual Review of Psychology, 2016

Although aging is associated with clear declines in physical and cognitive processes, emotional f... more Although aging is associated with clear declines in physical and cognitive processes, emotional functioning fares relatively well. Consistent with this behavioral profile, two core emotional brain regions, the amygdala and ventromedial prefrontal cortex, show little structural and functional decline in aging, compared with other regions. However, emotional processes depend on interacting systems of neurotransmitters and brain regions that go beyond these structures. This review examines how age-related brain changes influence processes such as attending to and remembering emotional stimuli, regulating emotion, and recognizing emotional expressions, as well as empathy, risk taking, impulsivity, behavior change, and attentional focus.

Http Dx Doi Org 10 1162 Jocn_A_00392, Mar 26, 2013

As people get older, they tend to remember more positive than negative information. This age-by-v... more As people get older, they tend to remember more positive than negative information. This age-by-valence interaction has been called "positivity effect." The current study addressed the hypotheses that baseline functional connectivity at rest is predictive of older adults' brain activity when learning emotional information and their positivity effect in memory. Using fMRI, we examined the relationship among resting-state functional connectivity, subsequent brain activity when learning emotional faces, and individual differences in the positivity effect (the relative tendency to remember faces expressing positive vs. negative emotions). Consistent with our hypothesis, older adults with a stronger positivity effect had increased functional coupling between amygdala and medial PFC (MPFC) during rest. In contrast, younger adults did not show the association between resting connectivity and memory positivity. A similar age-by-memory positivity interaction was also found when learning emotional faces. That is, memory positivity in older adults was associated with (a) enhanced MPFC activity when learning emotional faces and (b) increased negative functional coupling between amygdala and MPFC when learning negative faces. In contrast, memory positivity in younger adults was related to neither enhanced MPFC activity to emotional faces, nor MPFC-amygdala connectivity to negative faces. Furthermore, stronger MPFC-amygdala connectivity during rest was predictive of subsequent greater MPFC activity when learning emotional faces. Thus, emotion-memory interaction in older adults depends not only on the task-related brain activity but also on the baseline functional connectivity.

How can functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) advance cognitive theory? Some have argued t... more How can functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) advance cognitive theory? Some have argued that fMRI can do little beyond localizing brain regions that carry out certain cognitive functions (and may not even be able to do that). However, in this article, we argue that fMRI can inform theories of cognition by helping to answer at least four distinct kinds of questions. Which mental functions are performed in brain regions specialized for just that function (and which are performed in more generalpurpose brain machinery)? When fMRI markers of a particular Mental Process X are found, is Mental Process X engaged when people perform Task Y? How distinct are the representations of different stimulus classes? Do specific pairs of tasks engage common or distinct processing mechanisms? Thus, fMRI data can be used to address theoretical debates that have nothing to do with where in the brain a particular process is carried out.

Psychological Science

Negative stereotypes about aging can impair older adults' memory via stereotype threat; howev... more Negative stereotypes about aging can impair older adults' memory via stereotype threat; however, the mechanisms underlying this phenomenon are unclear. In two experiments, we tested competing predictions derived from two theoretical accounts of stereotype threat: executive-control interference and regulatory fit. Older adults completed a working memory test either under stereotype threat about age-related memory declines or not under such threat. Monetary incentives were manipulated such that recall led to gains or forgetting led to losses. The executive-control-interference account predicts that stereotype threat decreases the availability of executive-control resources and hence should impair working memory performance. The regulatory-fit account predicts that threat induces a prevention focus, which should impair performance when gains are emphasized but improve performance when losses are emphasized. Results were consistent only with the regulatory-fit account. Although ster...

Quarterly journal of experimental psychology (2006)

Stereotype threat often incurs the cost of reducing the amount of information that older adults a... more Stereotype threat often incurs the cost of reducing the amount of information that older adults accurately recall. In the current research, we tested whether stereotype threat can also benefit memory. According to the regulatory focus account of stereotype threat, threat induces a prevention focus in which people become concerned with avoiding errors of commission and are sensitive to the presence or absence of losses within their environment. Because of this, we predicted that stereotype threat might reduce older adults' memory errors. Results were consistent with this prediction. Older adults under stereotype threat had lower intrusion rates during free-recall tests (Experiments 1 and 2). They also reduced their false alarms and adopted more conservative response criteria during a recognition test (Experiment 2). Thus, stereotype threat can decrease older adults' false memories, albeit at the cost of fewer veridical memories, as well.

Recent years have seen a rejuvenation of interest in studies of motivation-cognition interactions... more Recent years have seen a rejuvenation of interest in studies of motivation-cognition interactions arising from many different areas of psychology and neuroscience. The present issue of Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience provides a sampling of some of the latest research from a number of these different areas. In this introductory article, we provide an overview of the current state of the field, in terms of key research developments and candidate neural mechanisms receiving focused investigation as potential sources of motivation-cognition interaction. However, our primary goal is conceptual: to highlight the distinct perspectives taken by different research areas, in terms of how motivation is defined, the relevant dimensions and dissociations that are emphasized, and the theoretical questions being targeted. Together, these distinctions present both challenges and opportunities for efforts aiming toward a more unified and cross-disciplinary approach. We identify a set of pressing research questions calling for this sort of cross-disciplinary approach, with the explicit goal of encouraging integrative and collaborative investigations directed toward them.