Irrelevant positive emotional information facilitates response inhibition only under a high perceptual load

Response inhibition involves suppressing those responses that are no longer needed. Previous research has separately studied the role of attentional resources and emotional information in response inhibition. Here, we simultaneously manipulate attentional resources and emotional information to investigate the interactive role of emotional information and attentional resources. Attentional resources were manipulated by changing the levels of perceptual load (low and high) of go signals. Emotional information was manipulated by changing the emotional content (irrelevant positive and negative emotional information) of the stop signals. Participants made a go response based on searching for a target letter in conditions of either low perceptual load or high perceptual load. They withheld their response on the presentation of a stop signal. The stop-signal stimulus was selected from two classes: arousal matched positive and negative IAPS images (Experiment 1) and happy, angry, and neutral faces (Experiment 2). The result showed a consistent interaction pattern of perceptual load and emotional information across the two experiments, such that irrelevant positive emotional information consistently improved inhibitory control, albeit only under high load. These results have theoretical implications for understanding the nature of emotional information and their interaction with attentional resources in cognitive control functions.