The late positive potential (LPP) is increasingly used as an indicator of emotional salience, which can be reduced by effective emotion regulation (ER), thus making LPP differences a practical marker of ER effects. One commonly used ER strategy is that of explicit distraction, a form of distraction that is consciously monitored and directed. Studies have shown that distraction modulates the LPP, and there are theoretical as well as empirical reasons to suspect that distraction occurs at an early stage in the timecourse of the LPP. However, the consistency of these findings have not yet been systematically assessed. This systematic review was conducted to address this gap in the literature. Following a literature search across three databases, nine empirical studies were systematically reviewed to assess the consistency of the effect of distraction on LPP latency and amplitudes. Mean LPP amplitude measurements from 270 healthy young adults, engaging in distraction and passive viewing during exposure to emotional stimuli, were gathered and reviewed. Mean differences were compared to assess the consistency of the LPP during distraction. Results showed consistent early LPP activation at centro-parietal sites, but not at frontal sites. These findings support the predictions of the process model of ER and its conceptualization of distraction as an antecedent strategy. The review was limited by the small number of studies, low mean ages of participants, and lack of diversity in stimuli, among other factors. As additional research is needed to further the scientific understanding of ER and its mechanisms, future directions are suggested.

Rejection sensitivity (RS) can have significant effects on interpersonal relationships. Previous research has shown the negative social effects of RS, but less is known about the cognitive implications of having high levels of RS. The current study examined the effect of RS on various event-related potential (ERP) components associated with performance monitoring (error-related negativity, ERN; feedback-related negativity, FRN) and attention (P300; late positive potential, LPP). Participants completed a social or nonsocial Flanker task and an emotional Stroop task. Results showed an increased ERN on error trials for individuals with higher RS. Although the FRN, P300, and LPP were not influenced by RS, FRN was influenced by an expectancy-valence interaction. FRN amplitude was also sensitive to condition, with correct feedback eliciting significantly more negative FRN in the social condition compared to the nonsocial condition; FRN for unexpected feedback was also greater in the social condition. Overall, the results suggest a relationship between error monitoring and RS, as well as a relationship between social information and feedback processing. Future research should further explore the potential relationship between rejection sensitivity and attention throughout goal-directed tasks.

Exposure to interparental conflict has been implicated in children's development. Research suggests that underlying mechanisms, such as neuropsychological indicators of cognitive processes, may shed light on how exposure to interparental conflict differentially influences children's outcomes over time. Event-related potentials (ERP), extracted from electroencephalogram data, allow for examination of neuropsychological markers of cognition based on precise timing and scalp topography of electrical activity in the brain. For example, the late positive potential (LPP) ERP component has been implicated in the timing and magnitude of sustained attention and emotion regulation processes elicited in response to emotionally salient stimuli. LPP amplitudes and peak latencies were compared for a community sample of 23 children (9-11 years of age, 12 females) during an oddball task, which used images of couples looking angry, happy, and neutral toward each other. Linear mixed models were used to analyze whether children's perceptions of interparental conflict, and whether they were from high- compared to low-conflict homes, influenced their level of neuropsychological resources directed toward angry compared to happy emotionally-charged interpersonal images. Significant results were found for when children were directed to respond to angry images. Differences emerged in LPP amplitudes for all children in the sample, with the greatest amplitudes produced for happy images compared to neutral and angry images. Regarding conflict exposure and perceptions of conflict, children from homes with greater levels of conflict and children who blamed themselves for conflicts they witnessed between parents produced greater LPP amplitudes when happy trials were presented compared to neutral trials. Finally, females reached their maximum LPP amplitude faster than males for neutral trials compared to angry trials. Results are discussed in terms of the implications for children's processing of interpersonal emotions as it is related to underlying neuropsychological mechanisms for sustained attention and emotion regulation.

<p>The role of attention and perceptual resources were studied in a one-back task and a letter-search task, both using the same stimuli. In the letter task, pictures were used as task-irrelevant and distracting emotional stimuli. The emotional processing of the pictures was measured through the Late Positive Potential (LPP), an event-related potential (ERP) recorded with EEG. LPP activity was significantly greater to emotional than neutral stimuli during the one-back task; this shows that emotional stimuli were processed during an easy task (low load). However, LPP activity dropped for all stimuli during the difficult perceptual task (high load). Selective processes of attention are discussed, in relation to Load Theory and the ability to ignore task-irrelevant, but emotionally significant, stimuli.</p>

Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) is thought to be characterized by emotion regulation deficits, including decreased use of adaptive strategies such as reappraisal, but little is known about the exact nature of these deficits and whether or not they are specific to the depressed mood state. The late positive potential (LPP) is a sustained positive deflection of the event-related potential (ERP) associated with responding to emotionally-valenced stimuli, and reappraisal strategies have been found to reduce LPP magnitude in response to emotional stimuli in healthy individuals, but this effect has not been examined in MDD. This study utilized ERPs to examine emotional reactivity to positive and negative pictures during passive viewing and a reappraisal condition in a sample 25 of individuals with current MDD, 26 with remitted depression (RMD), and 26 healthy controls. The LPP was greater for passive viewing of positive and negative relative to neutral pictures in all groups, with no significant group findings emerging. For positive pictures, all groups showed reduced LPP's for positive reappraisal relative to passive viewing with no group by condition interactions. For negative pictures, both the MDD and RMD groups exhibited abnormalities, with the MDD group failing to show a reduction in LPP for reappraised pictures relative to passive viewing and the RMD group demonstrating an unexpected increase in LPP magnitude for reappraised negative pictures. The LPP for emotional pictures and reappraisal instructions may reveal deficits in emotional reactivity and regulation among mood-disordered individuals, particularly for negative stimuli, and may suggest targets for clinical intervention.

The role of attention and perceptual resources were studied in a one-back task and a letter-search task, both using the same stimuli. In the letter task, pictures were used as task-irrelevant and distracting emotional stimuli. The emotional processing of the pictures was measured through the Late Positive Potential (LPP), an event-related potential (ERP) recorded with EEG. LPP activity was significantly greater to emotional than neutral stimuli during the one-back task; this shows that emotional stimuli were processed during an easy task (low load). However, LPP activity dropped for all stimuli during the difficult perceptual task (high load). Selective processes of attention are discussed, in relation to Load Theory and the ability to ignore task-irrelevant, but emotionally significant, stimuli.

The late positive potential (LPP) is an event-related potential (ERP) component associated with increased affective processing. Studies have shown that stimuli with high evolutionary significance (e.g. a threatening face) induce increased activity over centro-parietal areas of the brain. In an electrophysiological context, this is hypothesized to be indexed by greater LPP amplitudes. The facial width-to-height ratio (fWHR) is a facial-masculinity metric which refers to cheekbone width, divided by upper facial height (top of the lip to between the brows). For the first time, LPP amplitudes were examined in subjects upon observing faces with high vs. low facial fWHRs. Prior studies suggest that faces with high fWHRs are perceived as more threatening than faces with low fWHRs. Consequently, fWHR has by some researchers been proposed to serve as a cue of threat. Two separate tasks in the present study were used to investigate this. In the aggression task, males with high fWHRs were judged as more aggressive. Moreover, when put in a threatening context, high fWHR faces also elicited greater LPP amplitudes in subjects compared to faces with low fWHRs. Conversely, in the self-regulation task, differences in LPP amplitudes did not reach significance. In this task, statistical power was low due to few blocks/trials in the ERP experiment and subjects were not primed on threat, which may explain the non-significant results. Taken together, the results provide modest support to the theory that fWHR serve as a cue of threat. Future studies will need to take the present study’s limitations into consideration

人們對於錯誤訊息處理經由自我覺察或外在回饋之管道，可藉由事件關聯電位分別測得ERN (error-related negativity) 及FRN (feedback-related negativity)。過去研究曾指出雙側作業(Flanker task)中錯誤所引發的ERN會受到以圖片呈現的短期情緒所調節，然而對於回饋誘發的FRN與個體情緒調節的關係則未曾被探討過。過去FRN的研究認為唯有當受試者所進行的作業為增強學習作業時，受試者對於回饋結果的預期狀態才能反映於FRN的反應強度。本研究利用兩個實驗分別採用非增強學習作業及增強學習作業，其中並以IAPS情緒圖片進行短期情緒的引發，在受試者於實驗中對其反應結果的不同預期狀態，探測受試者FRN受短期情緒調節的效果。 實驗一利用非增強學習作業，結果顯示FRN的強度可以反映受試者對於回饋結果的預期狀態，其中以非預期時FRN的強度為最大，預期時FRN的強度為最小；另外，正向情緒圖片對於FRN具有調節效果，正向情緒下FRN反應強度小於中性以及負向情緒下FRN反應強度。實驗二利用增強學習作業，前述的FRN強度反映受試者對回饋結果的預期效果，只有在實驗前半段的嘗試次中被觀測到，此效果未見於全部嘗試次納入分析；另外，實驗二中沒有觀察到情緒對於FRN的調節效果。 綜合而言，本研究發現受試者唯有持續處於學習的情形下，FRN才能反映受試者對於回饋結果的預期狀態，情緒對FRN的調節效果也僅於此情況下才能被觀測到。 / Error-related information in human can be processed via self-awareness and/or feedback given externally, which are measurable by the use of event-related potential (ERP) and termed error-related negativity (ERN) and feedback-related negativity (FRN) respectively. Previous studies showed that short-term affective stimuli would modulate the magnitude of ERN elicited by Flanker task. However, such modulation effect has not been tested on FRN. Furthermore, the magnitude of FRN is indicated to be related to the expectancy states toward feedback when the subject is undergoing a reinforcement learning task. Present study, thus, was designed to test the affective modulation effect on FRN in two separate tasks. In which, emotional pictures adopted from IAPS were used as the short-term affective stimuli, and different expectancy states in both non-reinforcement learning task (Experiment1) and reinforcement learning task (Experiment 2) were manipulated. In the results of Experiment 1, the magnitude of FRN was larger under the unexpected condition in comparing to the expected one. Modulation effect of short-term affective stimuli on FRN was obtained when positive emotion pictures were presented in non-reinforcement learning task, which FRN amplitude was significantly smaller in comparing to those measured after the presentation of neutral and negative pictures. In the results of Experiment 2, FRN elicited in the unexpected condition was only obtained from analyzing the dada collected in the first half of trails. Such effect was not confirmed when the data from all trials were analyzed. A lack of modulation effect of short-term affective stimuli on FRN appeared in Experiment 2. In conclusion, it is indicated that the expectancy depended FRN is most apparent when the subject is undergoing a continuous learning-demanded process. Meanwhile, short-term affective stimuli can modulate such FRN.

L’état d’attention sans réflexion, aussi appelé « mindfulness », a démontré des effets positifs en clinique pour les désordres émotionnels associés à diverses conditions. Le nombre d’études portant sur la caractérisation des substrats neuronaux de cet état attentionnel croît, mais il importe d’investiguer davantage à ce chapitre pour éventuellement améliorer les interventions cliniques. La présente étude compte aider à déterminer, par la magnétoencéphalographie, quelles régions cérébrales sont en corrélation avec le mindfulness chez des experts, i.e. des méditants Zen. Ces derniers cultivent un état dans lequel ils s’abstiennent de rechercher ou de rejeter les phénomènes sensoriels, ce qui en fait d’excellents candidats à la présente étude. Dans un contexte de stimulations visuelles émotionnelles, il fut demandé aux méditants tantôt d’observer les images dans un état de mindfulness (condition expérimentale), tantôt dans un état dit normal (condition contrôle) où aucun effort particulier d’attention n’était requis. Les résultats d’analyse suggèrent que les participants expérimentèrent une intensité émotionnelle moins importante en mindfulness : les cotes subjectives ainsi qu’une réponse magnétique cérébrale reliée aux émotions nommée Potentiel Positif Tardif magnétique (PPTm) suggèrent cela. Cependant, le résultat le plus statistiquement probant dépasse la nature affective des stimuli. Il s’agit d’une diminution temporellement soutenue de l’activité de fréquence gamma au niveau des zones visuelles associatives du lobe temporal droit, sans égard à la nature des images. Également, une suppression de l’activité gamma d’une zone du cortex préfrontal latéral gauche fut observée. Ceci pourrait indiquer une diminution de la conceptualisation des stimuli reliée au langage et aux processus réflectifs du soi. / Non-elaborative attentional stance, called mindfulness, demonstrated many positive clinical effects on emotional disorders associated with various medical conditions. The amount of scientific papers addressing the neuronal basis of this attentional stance increases but there is still a need to further investigate, in order to potentially improve clinical interventions. The present study aims to determine, by use of magnetoencephalography, which brain regions correlate with mindfulness in experts, namely, zen meditators. These people cultivate a state in which they abstain from rejecting or seeking sensorial phenomena. In a context of emotional visual stimulation, meditators were instructed to observe images with mindfulness (experimental condition) or without making any effort to do so (control condition). Results suggest that participants experienced less intense emotions in a state of mindfulness: both subjective ratings and an evoked brain response known to be related to emotional intensity, the magnetic Late Positive Potential (mLPP), suggest this. However, the most statistically convincing result surpasses the emotional nature of the presented stimuli. It is a sustained diminution of induced oscillations in the gamma band localized in visual associative regions of the right temporal lobe, regardless of the emotional nature of stimuli. Additionally, mindfulness is associated to a suppression of gamma activity in the left lateral prefrontal cortex. This may indicate a diminution of language-mediated conceptualization of visual stimuli and self-reflective processes. Those results bring a new light on the neural substrate of mindfulness, mostly studied with more limited brain imaging techniques on the level of temporal resolution.

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