Cited by 147Neural and Behavioral Psychology StudiesAnxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive ProcessesTreatment of Major Depression

Distracted and down: neural mechanisms of affective interference in subclinical depression

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Kaiser, Roselinde H., Andrews-Hanna, Jessica R., Spielberg, Jeffrey M., Warren, Stacie L., Sutton, Bradley P., Miller, Gregory A., Heller, Wendy, Banich, Marie T.·2015·Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience

Abstract

Previous studies have shown that depressed individuals have difficulty directing attention away from negative distractors, a phenomenon known as affective interference. However, findings are mixed regarding the neural mechanisms and network dynamics of affective interference. The present study addressed these issues by comparing neural activation during emotion-word and color-word Stroop tasks in participants with varying levels of (primarily subclinical) depression. Depressive symptoms predicted increased activation to negative distractors in areas of dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and posterior cingulate cortex (PCC), regions implicated in cognitive control and internally directed attention, respectively. Increased dACC activity was also observed in the group-average response to incongruent distractors, suggesting that dACC activity during affective interference is related to overtaxed cognitive control. In contrast, regions of PCC were deactivated across the group in response to incongruent distractors, suggesting that PCC activity during affective interference represents task-independent processing. A psychophysiological interaction emerged in which higher depression predicted more positively correlated activity between dACC and PCC during affective interference, i.e. greater connectivity between cognitive control and internal-attention systems. These findings suggest that, when individuals high in depression are confronted by negative material, increased attention to internal thoughts and difficulty shifting resources to the external world interfere with goal-directed behavior.

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  • Selective attention, interference processing, and working memory are cognitive domains all impacted in depression.

    “cognitive domains that are all impacted in depression [93–96]”

    From Personalized machine learning guided intervention for optimizing lifestyle behaviors in depression: a pilot study (2026) · cites this paper as [96]

    The Abstract (page unavailable) says depressed individuals have difficulty directing attention away from negative distractors, and the Discussion (page unavailable) reports that depressive-symptom severity predicts affective interference. These support the attention and interference portions of the claim. Working memory appears in a cited reference, but the paper does not itself report a working-memory finding. (LLM, conf=0.86)

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Authors
Kaiser, R. H., Andrews-Hanna, J. R., Spielberg, J. M., Warren, S. L., Sutton, B. P., Miller, G. A., Heller, W., & Banich, M. T.
Affiliations
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (US)
Venue
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
Published
2014-07-25
Volume
10
Issue
5
Pages
654-663
ISSN
  • 1749-5016 (ISSN-L)
  • 1749-5024
OpenAlex
W2125751684
Cited by
147
References
81
Citations by year
2026: 7 · 2025: 10 · 2024: 8 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 54 · 2019: 9 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 4 · 2015: 8
FWCI
3.53
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
cc-by-nc
Locations
  • Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Funders
  • National Institutes of Health (MH079485)
  • National Institute of Mental Health (R01 MH-61358, P50MH079485, T32MH019554, T32 MH-19554, R01MH061358)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Pharmacology › Treatment of Major Depression
Keywords
emotional interference, subthreshold depression, Stroop task, dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, posterior cingulate cortex, cognitive control, distractor processing, psychophysiological interaction, neuronal connectivity, negative emotion words, attentional bias
MeSH terms
Adolescent, Adult, Affect, Attention, Cerebral Cortex, Depressive Disorder, Female, Humans, Individuality, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Neural Pathways, Photic Stimulation, Psychiatric Status Rating Scales, Psychomotor Performance, Reaction Time, Young Adult, Stroop Test

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