Involuntary sensory enhancement of gain- and loss-associated tones: A general relevance principle

In a recent event-related potential (ERP) study (Folyi et al., 2016), we have demonstrated that sensory processing of task-irrelevant tones is enhanced when they were previously associated with positive or negative (by the means of monetary gains and losses, respectively) affective meaning relative to tones with neutral meaning, as indexed by the enhancement of the auditory NI-amplitude. In the present study, (1) in line with the hypothesis of affective counter-regulation, we investigated whether positive versus negative tones can receive differential attentional enhancement, depending on motivational context (Experiment 1); and (2) whether the early facilitation of positive and negative tones can operate strictly outside of the focus of voluntary attention (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, we replicated the basic N1 valence effect, but found no moderation by motivational context. In Experiment 2, we found a small valence effect on the NI. By combining data from the three experiments (i.e., our previous experiment and the present ones; N = 72), we found a clear enhancement of NI amplitudes for valenced tones without moderation by experiment. This pattern of results suggests comparable early attentional enhancement of valenced tones in general: (a) despite different level of concurrent task-relevant attentional and motivational demands in these experiments; and (b) without prioritizing one valence category over another, supporting our claim that the general relevance of the tones with high motivational value that governs early attentional facilitation.