Emotional responding in depression: Distinctions in the time course of emotion

The current studies were designed to investigate if the emotion context insensitivity hypothesis (ECI; Rottenberg & Gotlib, 2004) is applicable across the time course of emotion. Recent affective science research has pointed to the importance of considering anticipation and maintenance of emotion. In the current studies, we assessed emotion responses among college students with depression symptoms in anticipation of, during, and after an emotional picture using the emotion modulated startle paradigm. People with and without depression symptoms did not differ in blink magnitude in anticipation of emotional pictures suggesting that some anticipatory processes may not be impaired by depression symptoms. In contrast, individuals with depression symptoms did not exhibit blink magnitudes that varied by valence, either during viewing or after the pictures were removed from view. These findings suggest that ECI is relevant not only for those diagnosed with major depressive disorder, but also for people with depression symptoms that may not cross the diagnostic threshold. These data also point to the importance of considering the time course of emotion to better understand emotional deficits in individuals with differing levels of depression symptoms. Identifying where emotion goes awry across the time course of emotion can help inform treatment development.     

Elemental and configural processing of novel cues in deterministic and probabilistic tasks

Three experiments examined whether transfer of past learning depends on how well the original discrimination is learned. To vary terminal learning levels, cues were either perfect (deterministic) or imperfect (probabilistic) predictors of a trial’s outcome. Participants in Experiment 1 acquired a configural, an elemental or a control discrimination. Tests for generalization showed that past learning influenced the processing of new compounds formed from elements of the original discrimination, especially so when the original discrimination was deterministic. Similar results were found in Experiment 2 when the test stimuli were elements derived from novel compounds presented after the original discrimination was acquired. Experiment 3 used filler trials to equate learning in the probabilistic and deterministic tasks, and demonstrated that final levels of learning, rather than task per se, was the critical variable mediating transfer. Implications for rule-based and associative theories are discussed.     

Conditions favoring superconditioning of irrelevant conditioned stimuli

Three appetitive conditioning experiments with rats found partial learning of complex XA+, XB+, XAB- (+ stands for reinforced; - stands for unreinforced) negative patterning discriminations with intermixed A+ and B+ trials (Experiment 1). AB+ trials (Experiment 2), and A+, B+, and AB+ trials (Experiment 3). In all experiments, differential responding emerged more slowly during the learning of the negative patterning discriminations than during learning of the XA+, XB+, XC- control discriminations. Additionally, the negative patterning groups responded more to X than to a separately reinforced Y on unreinforced test trials: thus, X derived superexcitatory properties. This pattern was reversed in the control groups. Results are consistent with theories that allow for different activation patterns when elements are combined.     

Subgoals as substitutes or complements: the role of goal accessibility

The self-regulation process often involves breaking an ongoing goal (e.g., keeping in shape) into many individual, constituent subgoals that monitor actual actions (e.g., eating healthy meals, going to the gym). The article examines how pursuing each of these subgoals may influence subsequent goal pursuit. The authors show that when people consider success on a single subgoal, additional actions toward achieving a superordinate goal are seen as substitutes and are less likely to be pursued. In contrast, when people consider their commitment to a superordinate goal on the basis of initial success on a subgoal, additional actions toward achieving that goal may seem to be complementary and more likely to be pursued. These predictions were tested in four studies that explored the conditions under which subgoals attainment have a counterproductive versus favorable effect on further pursuit of similar actions.     

Acquisition of superexcitatory properties by an irrelevant background stimulus

Six appetitive conditioning experiments with rats demonstrated that an irrelevant X accompanying a negative patterning discrimination (XA+, XB+, XAB-) acquires extraordinarily high levels of conditioned excitation. Responding to X was similar to that evoked by 2 excitors in combination (Experiment 1) and was greater than responding to a separately reinforced Y (Experiments 2-5). Superexcitatory properties were not acquired by X in the nonpatterning discriminations of Experiments 2-4. Experiment 5 found that A and B, if anything, were weakly excitatory. Making them more strongly excitatory after conditioning did not interfere with retention of the original discrimination (Experiment 6). Results support a counterintuitive prediction of associative theories that, under carefully arranged conditions, irrelevant stimuli may acquire superexcitatory properties.     

Daily Affect and Intimacy in Emerging Adult Couples

We investigated individual- and couple-level associations between daily intimacy and affective states (N = 2211 observations) in 20 heterosexual emerging adult couples (age 18–25 years, M = 23) who had been in a sexual relationship with one another for at least 3 weeks (M = 12 months). Individual analyses revealed that emerging adults’ feelings of intimacy varied from day to day and that there were no gender differences in daily intimacy. Affect and intimacy were positively associated within day for women, but not for men. Time-lagged individual-level analyses revealed that prior-day positive or negative affect did not predict present-day intimacy for men or women. However, prior-day intimacy positively predicted present-day positive affect in men and negatively predicted present-day negative affect in women. Time-lagged couple-level analyses revealed that men’s prior-day positive affect positively predicted their female partner’s present-day intimacy. Women’s prior-day intimacy negatively predicted their male partner’s present-day negative affect. Implications of the day-to-day associations of intimacy with positive and negative affect within emerging adult couples are discussed.