Neuroticism and Attentional Biases for Threatening Stimulus

Abstract

The role of the different dimensions of the personality in the cognitive processing includes some important research areas in the field of cognitive psychology. The present study aimed to investigate differences of attentional bias in individual with up and down neuroticism. For this purpose, 130 subjects (67 people with high neuroticism and 63 people with low neuroticism) were completed word-picture task and the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire. The main and interactive effect and Pearson correlation coefficient were used to investigate the relationship between neuroticism and Attentional bias. The results showed that people with high neuroticism compared to people with low neuroticism perform slower in experimental trials. In addition, the resulting correlation coefficient indicated a positive and meaningful relationship between neuroticism and Attentional bias, it seems that along with increased scores of people in neuroticism, more Attentional bias was showing by them. These findings indicated that the necessity of using treatment strategies tailored to the characteristics of personality was multiplied.