A Study On The Characteristics Of Attentional Control And Its Resting-state Brain Function In College Students With High Trait Test Anxiety

Examination is one of the important and common methods to evaluate educational achievements and select talents.High test anxiety has a debilitating effect on academic performance and physical and mental health.Trait test anxiety(TTA)refers to a stable individual differences in the tendency to perceive examinations as threatening: high TTA individuals respond to examinations with elevations in state anxiety.One of the most important cognitive characteristics of high TTA individuals is deficits in attentional control.Therefore,it is helpful to understand the nature of test anxiety to investigate the behavioral characteristics and neural basis of attentional control in high TTA individuals.Inhibition and shifting functions are two components of attentional control.It is not clear whether the insufficient attentional control for test-related threatening stimuli in high TTA individuals is due to inhibition function deficits,shifting function deficits,or both deficits.It is still controversial whether high TTA individuals have a general(i.e.,not emotional-specific)impairment of attentional control.The factors influencing attentional control in high TTA individuals and the neural basis of reduced attentional control ability in high TTA individuals are currently scant.In the current paper,four studies,including ten experiments,were used to explore the above problems.The aim of study 1 was to investigate the reason for the impaired attentional control in face of test-related threatening stimuli for high TTA individuals,including experiment 1a and experiment 1b.Experiment 1a examined the inhibition function with test-related threatening stimuli in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA college students completed an emotional Stroop task.Participants were instructed to indicate as quickly and accurately as possible whether words appeared in red or green color.A 2(group: high TTA,low TTA)× 2(stimuli type: test-related threatening,test-unrelated neutral)mixed design was employed.When the Stroop effect was the dependent variable,the results showed that compared with the low TTA group,the high TTA group showed a significantly larger Stroop effect in reaction time(RT).Experiment 1b examined the shifting function with test-related threatening stimuli in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA college students completed an emotional version of the internal switch task(IST).Participants were instructed to keep a silent mental count of the respective number of test-related words and test-unrelated words.A 2(group: high TTA,low TTA)× 2(stimuli type of trail n-1: test-related threatening,test-unrelated neutral)× 2(stimuli type of trial n: test-related threatening,test-unrelated neutral)mixed design was employed.When the switch cost was the dependent variable,the results showed that compared with the low TTA group,the high TTA group showed a significantly larger switch cost in RT.The aim of study 2 was to investigate whether high TTA individuals have a general impairment of attentional control,including experiment 2a and experiment 2b.Experiment 2a examined the inhibition function with test-unrelated neutral stimuli in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA college students completed a color-word Stroop task.Participants were instructed to indicate as quickly and accurately as possible whether Chinese characters and symbols appeared in red or green color.A 2(group: high TTA,low TTA)×3(stimuli type: congruent,incongruent,neutral)mixed design was employed.When the Stroop effect was the dependent variable,the results showed that compared with the low TTA group,the high TTA group showed a significantly larger Stroop effect in RT.Experiment 2b examined the shifting function with test-unrelated neutral stimuli in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA college students completed a non-emotional version of the IST.Participants were instructed to keep a silent mental count of the respective number of rectangles and triangles.A 2(group: high TTA,low TTA)× 2(stimuli type: repeat,switch)mixed design was employed.When the switch cost was the dependent variable,the results showed that compared with the low TTA group,the high TTA group showed a significantly larger switch cost in RT.The aim of study 3 was to investigate the effects of working memory capacity(WMC)and task difficulty on attentional control in high TTA individuals,including experiment 3a,experiment 3b,experiment 3c and experiment 3d.Experiment 3a examined the effect of WMC on inhibition function in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA college students were recruited.Their WMC and inhibition function were estimated by an automated version of the operation span task and a color-word Stroop task,respectively.A 2(TTA: high,low)× 2(WMC: high,low)× 3(stimuli type: congruent,incongruent,neutral)mixed design was employed.When the Stroop effect was the dependent variable,the results showed that compared with the low TTA group,the high TTA group showed a significantly larger Stroop effect in RT.Compared with the high WMC group,the low WMC group showed a significantly larger Stroop effect in RT.No significant interaction between TTA and WMC was found.Experiment 3b examined the effect of WMC on shifting function in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA college students were recruited.Their WMC and shifting function were estimated by an automated version of the operation span task and a more-odd shifting task,respectively.A 2(TTA: high,low)× 2(WMC: high,low)× 2(stimuli type: repeat,switch)mixed design was employed.When the switch cost was the dependent variable,the results showed that compared with the low TTA group,the high TTA group showed a significantly larger switch cost in RT.No significant main effect of WMC or the interaction between TTA and WMC were found.Experiment 3c examined the effect of task difficulty on inhibition function in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA college students were recruited.A dual-task paradigm was employed,in which participants were instructed to indicate the color of Chinese characters and symbols as quickly and accurately as possible while holding either six of the same numbers(low difficulty)or six different numbers(high difficulty).A 2(group: high TTA,low TTA)×2(difficulty: high,low)× 3(stimuli type: congruent,incongruent,neutral)mixed design was employed.When the Stroop effect was the dependent variable,the results showed that compared with the low TTA group,the high TTA group showed a significantly larger Stroop effect in RT.No significant main effect of difficulty or the interaction between TTA and difficulty were found.Experiment 3d examined the effect of task difficulty on shifting function in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA college students were recruited.A cue-based and memory-based task switching paradigm was employed,in which participants were instructed to indicate the numerical value or the party of digits based on cues(low difficulty)or based on memory(high difficulty).A 2(group: high TTA,low TTA)× 2(difficulty: high,low)× 2(stimuli type: repeat,switch)mixed design was employed.When the switch cost was the dependent variable,the results showed a significant interaction between the TTA and the difficulty.The RT switch costs of the two groups were similar when the task difficulty was low and the RT switch cost was significantly larger for high TTA group than for the low TTA group when the task difficulty was high.The aim of study 4 was to investigate the neural basis of impaired attentional control in high TTA individuals,including experiment 4a and experiment 4b.Experiment 4a examined the resting-state functional characteristics of attentional control related brain regions in high TTA individuals.High and low TTA individuals completed Attentional Control Scale and their resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging(f MRI)data were obtained.A single-factor between-subjects(group: high TTA,low TTA)design was employed.The results showed that compared with the low TTA group,the high TTA group showed significantly higher attentional control scores,smaller amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation in right middle frontal gyrus and right anterior cingulate cortex(ACC),smaller regional homogeneity in left ACC and weaker functional connection(FC)between bilateral superior frontal gyrus,between bilateral inferior frontal gyrus,between left suprior frontal gyrus and right ACC,between midlle frontal gyrus and inferior frontal gyrus and between bilateral ACC.Experiment 4b examined the underlying mechanism that how TTA reduces attentional control in the brain.College students completed Test Anxiety Scale and Attentional Control Scale and their resting-state f MRI data were obtained.The brain regions identified in experiment4 a were regarded as regions of interest and their signals were extracted.Mediation analyses were performed with TTA as independent variable,resting-state brain activity as mediator variable and attentional control as dependent variable.The results showed that the FC between bilateral inferior frontal gyrus mediated the relationship between TTA and inhibition function.The FC between bilateral superior frontal gyrus mediated the relationship between TTA and shifting function.Based on the above results,the following conclusions can be drawn:(1)The insufficient attentional control with test-related threatening stimuli in high TTA indibiduals is due to both inhibition and shifting functions deficits.(2)High TTA individuals have a general impairment of attentional control,that is to say,they have insufficient attentional control with both test-related threatening stimuli and test-unrelated threatening stimuli.(3)The adverse effect of TTA on attentional control is not moderated by WMC.(4)The effect of task difficulty on attentional control in high TTA individuals is functionally specific.The adverse effect of TTA on shifting function,rather than inhibition function,is moderated by task difficulty.TTA-related deficits in shifting function may primarily occur at higher levels of task difficulty.(5)High TTA individuals have decreased resting-state function in the fronto-parietal network(FPN)and ACC related to attentional control.(6)The weaker FC within the FPN may be the neural basis for explaining the adverse effect of TTA on attentional control.The higher TTA predicts the decreased FC within the FPN,which in turn predicts decreased attentional control ability.