01650nas a2200253   4500000000100000008004100001260007600042653001200118653001400130653002100144653002000165653002300185653001100208100003500219700002000254700002600274700001900300245010600319300001200425490000700437520092400444022001401368020001401382       2013                            d  c06/2013bSociedad Española para el Estudio de la Ansiedad y el Estrés10aAnxiety10aAttention10aemotional stroop10aFace Perception10aFacial Expressions10athreat1 aAntonia Pilar Pacheco-Unguetti1 aJuan Lupiáñez1 aRaúl López-Benítez1 aAlberto Acosta00aEmotional Stroop with faces: Threatening information diverts unnecessary attention from the main task  a149-1600 v193 aIn this study, we examine whether the involuntary processing of facial expressions is modulated by perceptual load in a   go/no-go  task and by participants  trait anxiety level Fifty-two students selected according to their high vs. low trait anxiety levels carried out a high vs. low perceptual load letter discrimination task, in the presence of distracting angry, neutral or happy faces Results showed that under low perceptual load conditions and with angry faces as distractors, all participants had worse target discrimination (less perceptual sensitivity, as assessed by the d  parameter), and stricter response criteria (as indexed by β) Although these emotional Stroop effects were not modulated by trait anxiety, they seem to reflect genuine effects of distraction from threatening information, since they cannot be explained in terms of a general cognitive slowdown in the presence of negative information.  a1134-7937  a2174-0437