Trait anxiety and impoverished prefrontal control of attention.pdfVIP

A R T I C L E S Trait anxiety and impoverished prefrontal control of attention Sonia J Bishop1–3 Many neurocognitive models of anxiety emphasize the importance of a hyper-responsive threat-detection system centered on the amygdala, with recent accounts incorporating a role for prefrontal mechanisms in regulating attention to threat. Here we investigated whether trait anxiety is associated with a much broader dysregulation of attentional control. Volunteers performed . a response-conflict task under conditions that posed high or low demands on attention. High trait-anxious individuals showed d e reduced prefrontal activity and slower target identification in response to processing competition when the task did not fully v r e occupy attentional resources. The relationship between trait anxiety and prefrontal recruitment remained after controlling for s e state anxiety. These findings indicate that trait anxiety is linked to impoverished recruitment of prefrontal attentional control r s mechanisms to inhibit distractor processing even when threat-related stimuli are absent. Notably, this deficit was observed when t h g ongoing task-related demands on attention were low, potentially explaining the day-to-day difficulties in concentration that are i r l associated with clinical anxiety. l A . c n I , National surveys suggest that nearly 20% of the adult US population range of non-affective tasks that place demands on attentional or a c will meet criteria for one or more anxiety disorders in a 12-month cognitive control9–11. i r e period1. Anxiety is hugely disruptive to everyday life, placing an Neural models of attentional or cognitive control have implicated m A emotional burden on both individuals and their famili