Cognitive Processing Under Stressful Conditions: The Effects of Stress on Selective Attention
Date
2001
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Producer
Director
Performer
Choreographer
Costume Designer
Music
Videographer
Lighting Designer
Set Designer
Crew Member
Funder
Rehearsal Director
Concert Coordinator
Moderator
Panelist
Alternative Title
Department
Haverford College. Department of Psychology
Type
Thesis
Original Format
Running Time
File Format
Place of Publication
Date Span
Copyright Date
Award
Language
eng
Note
Table of Contents
Terms of Use
Rights Holder
Access Restrictions
Haverford users only
Terms of Use
Tripod URL
Identifier
Abstract
This study is an attempt to expand upon previous findings implicating a bias in selective attention for anxious subjects, to determine whether a similar bias in selective attention is true for subjects under academic and/or social stress. Seventy- seven Haverford College Students who were grouped according to high or low social, academic and trait stress, completed a dichotic listening task with academic, social or neutral words distracters. Shadowing errors and probe reaction times were analyzed. The results presented a complex set of findings based on subjects grouping into high or low trait, social or academic stress; target wordlist category (academic, social or neutral); and dependent measure (shadowing errors or probe reaction times). Overall, subjects displayed more shadowing errors when high in academic stress. Subjects low in trait stress were overall slower to respond to the probe overall compared to subjects high in trait stress. Subjects who were low in trait and academic stress were slower to respond to the probe presented during the neutral wordlist when they were high in social stress. Subjects who were low in trait and social stress were slower to respond to the probe presented during the academic wordlist when they were high in academic stress compared to when they were low in academic stress. These findings suggest that academic stress generally disrupts the ability to select out distracter words, whereas high trait stress leads to overall better performance on a secondary probe reaction task. In addition, the findings suggest that social and academic state stress lead to different biases in selective attention towards neutral distracter words for social stress and towards academic distracter words for academic stress, when low in all other categories.