| Popis: |
The present study attempts to identify how trait anxiety, measured as worry-level, affects the processing of threatening speech Two experiments using dichotic listening tasks were implemented; where participants had to identify sentences that convey threat through three different information channels: prosody-only, semantic-only and both semantic and prosody (congruent threat). We expected different ear advantages (left or right) depending on task demands, information type, and worry level. We used a full Bayesian approach for statistical modelling and analysis. Results indicate that when participants made delayed responses (Experiment 1), reaction times increased with worry level, but under time pressure (Experiment 2) worry level only affected reaction times for semantically neutral, prosodically threatening stimuli. We explain this effect by proposing a fourth stage, associated with goal oriented deliberation, for a three-phasic multistep model of emotional language processing. Higher levels of trait anxiety could induce verbal repetitive thinking (i.e. worry and/or rumination), which might prolong the mentioned deliberation stages, thus slowing-down responses. |
