Time Course Of Attentional Biases Toward Shape-Related Information Among Weight-dissatisfied Women

Weight-dissatisfaction refers to the negative perception,negative emotional experience and related behavioral adjustment that are caused by people who feel that their body shape is too fat(Chen,2006).Attentional biases refer to the fact that individuals have varying degrees of attentional assignment to specific information in comparison to neutral information(Vuilleumier,2005;Pourtois et al.,2013).Recently,many researchers have proposed that attentional bias is a significant factor in the appearance and retention of weight-dissatisfaction.Although there is considerable evidence to show that weight-dissatisfied individuals have attention biases toward shape-related information,consistent conclusions about the time course traits of their attention biases have not been drawn.Hence,the present study investigated the accurate time course of attention biases toward shape-related information among weight-dissatisfied individuals.The findings of the study may offer a theoretical support for preventing and intervening weight-dissatisfaction.In the Pre-test,30 female college students from a Chinese University were selected to evaluate the body shapes of 134 images and picked out 10 fat images,10 thin images and 40 neutral images depending on the evaluation score of each image for the Formal experiment.In the Formal experiment,Negative Physical Self Scale-Fatness(NPSS-F;Chen et al.,2006)investigated 41 participants out of 170 female students and categorized them as weight-dissatisfaction.In this experiment there were 21 participants in experimental group with high levels of weight dissatisfaction and 20 participants in control group with low levels of weight dissatisfaction.The body images(Fat,Thin,Neutral)scanned in Pre-test were used as cue in combination with event-related potentials and the dot-probe task.Study the accurate time course of attention biases toward shape-related information among weight-dissatisfied women.In this experiment,the fat-neutral image pairs,the thin-neutral image pairs and the neutral-neutral image pairs were presented on each side of the screen,and there was only one image pair displayed on the screen at any one time.After 500ms(Stimulus onset asynchrony,SOA),the probe array is presented.The probe array consists of two notch circles on the left and right sides of the screen,one of which may be a probe.The subject's task is to determine whether the notch of the probe is facing down or up.The EEG results induced by the cue array showed that the fat-neutral image pairs induced significant N2pc for the control group,the other image pairs for the control group and the three types of image pairs for the experimental group failed to induce significant N2pc.These results suggest that facilitated attention towards fat images for women with low weight dissatisfaction.In the experimental group,the fat-neutral image pairs induced significant Pd,but the other image pairs for the experimental group and the three types of image pairs for the control group failed to induce Pd.These results suggest that early attention avoidance to fat images for women with high weight dissatisfaction.The EEG results induced by the probe array showed for the experimental group the condition of the probe appears at the same side of the fat image position(that is,the probe appears at the same side of the neutral image position,consistent condition)after the fat-neutral image pairs induced P3 amplitude(365?415ms)is larger than the condition of the probe appears at the opposite side of the fat image position(that is,the probe appears at the same side of the neutral stimulus,inconsistent condition)after the fat-neutral image pairs.The other image pairs for the experimental group and the three types of image pairs for the control group failed to find such differences.These results suggest that in the late processing stage,spatial attention being directed away from fat images location for women with high weight dissatisfaction.In general,this study found that women with high weight dissatisfaction had attention avoidance to the fat image from the early stage to the late processing stage,and the control group had a facilitated attention to the fat image.