Anxiety and attention to threatening pictures

Previous research using attentional search tasks has revealed an anxiety-re lated bias favouring attention to threatening words when they are presented simultaneously with emotionally neutral words. In Experiment 1, using a si milar task, a related effect was found here with emotionally threatening pi ctures. When pictures were used as location cues in a second experiment, hi gh-trait anxious individuals were slower than less anxious controls when re sponding to targets requiring attentional disengagement from threat, and th ey were slower in general with pictures judged to be highly threatening. In a third experiment using the same task but with a longer cue exposure, a r elated disengagement difficulty occurred across both groups, although the m ore general slowing with severe threat was again confined to the anxious gr oup. We conclude that attentional bias involves both a specific difficulty in disengaging attention from the location of any threat and a more general interference effect that is related to threat level.