When affective cues broaden thought: Evidence from event-related potentials associated with identifying emotionally expressive faces

Divergent theoretical perspectives predict that the valence of affective cues impacts the breadth and flexibility of cognition, but extant data have not clarified whether such effects transpire extemporaneously or only later via processes of evaluation or selection from among thoughts already generated. The present investigation found more prominent electro-cortical event-related-potential (P3) responses among participants focused on identifying a positively valenced social target (an individual with a happy facial expression) than a negatively valenced social target (an individual with a disgusted facial expression). Indeed, even obvious non-targets (scrambled faces) evoked more-prominent P3 responses among participants in the happy-target than the disgusted-target condition, thereby implicating an effect of the valence of affective cues on the extent of cognitive processing as it unfolds.