The impact of rumination on internal attention switching

Abstract

The present study explored the nature of attention control problems associated with ruminative traits. Experiment 1 aimed to establish the validity of a modified mental counting task that assesses individuals’ ability to switch attention between internal mental representations. Reaction time and brain activity (event related potential; ERP) measures were examined, and results showed that the task was sensitive to internal attention switching effects. Experiment 2 assessed how the relationship between ruminative tendencies and switching performance differs when participants attend to neutral versus affective materials under different mood states. Although reaction-time analysis suggested that both mood condition and stimulus affectivity were not significant in altering this association, ERP analysis suggested otherwise. A significant task type×trait rumination × mood condition effect was found for switch-related ERP responses, whereby high ruminators were found to deploy more neuronal resources when switching affective materials in sad mood state.

Keywords:

• Rumination
• Attention switching
• Switch costs
• Event-related potentials
• Mood effects
• Stimulus affectivity

Notes

¹The slightly imbalanced number of subjects across the two mood-induction groups was a result of the fact that some subjects had been screened out for emotional dysfunctions during random allocation.

²As 15 subjects were excluded from ERP measures due to technical problem, the reaction-time analysis was run again based on the 43 subjects whose data had been successfully collected in both reaction time and ERP measures. The pattern of results was similar to that using the full sample of 58 subjects. The main effects of trait rumination, t(39) = 1.18, p>.05, and mood condition, t(39) = 0.20, p>.05, were both nonsignificant. The interaction between trait rumination and mood condition, t(39) = 1.58, p>.05, was also nonsignificant. However, unlike that observed with the full sample, the main effect of task type in the analysis of the smaller sample was nonsignificant, t(78) = 1.55, p<.05. All other interactions found were also nonsignificant.