Mengke Zhang

The functional neuro-anatomical model of attachment (NAMA) proposes that the balance between affective evaluation and cognitive control systems can be modulated by adult attachment styles and attachment priming. However, little is known about the characteristics of emotional conflict control that are modulated by attachment patterns. Accordingly, the present study adopted two experiments to investigate the associations between attachment styles, attachment (in)security priming, and emotional conflict control. Experiment 1 (N = 225) examined the association between attachment styles and emotional interference, demonstrating that individuals high on attachment anxiety (AX) relied more on affective evaluation to hinder conflict control. Furthermore, Experiment 2 (N = 185) explored the effect of attachment priming on emotional conflict control. Moderated mediation models indicated that high sense of attachment security mediated the relationship between security priming and increased emotional interference when it interacted with high AX. Additionally, high sense of insecurity partially mediated the association between threat priming and reduced emotional interference only for individuals with high AX, while low AX strengthened the effect of threat priming on decreased emotional interference. Together, these findings provide supporting evidence for the NAMA that the emotional-cognitive balance in emotional conflict control is modulated by both attachment styles and attachment priming.

Detecting and correcting execution errors is crucial for safe and efficient goal-directed behavior. Despite intensive investigations on error processing, the cognitive foundations of this process remain unclear. Based on the presumed relation between executive attention and error processing, we implemented a seven-day EA intervention by adopting the Posner cueing paradigm to test the potential causal link from EA to error processing in healthy adults. The experimental group was trained on the Posner cueing paradigm, with a ratio of invalid cue trials to valid cue trials of 5:1 and a corresponding ratio of 1:1 in the active control group. We found that the EA intervention improved EA across intervention sessions. Critically, after the EA intervention, the HEA group showed that post-error accuracy was restored to the same level as the post-correct accuracy. However, post-error slowing and the flanker effect were not modulated by the EA intervention. Furthermore, we observed that the changes in the accuracy of VC trials positively predicted the changes in PEA and that the two groups were classified according to the changes in PEA with a 61.3% accuracy. Based on these results, we propose that EA causally drives error processing. And the capabilities of the “actively catch” more attention resources and the automatic mismatch processing developed after EA intervention is transferable to error processing, thereby directly resulting in the gains in post-error adjustments. Our work informs the potential cognitive mechanisms underlying this causal link.