Attentional bias to threat: an investigation of psychological predictors beyond trait anxiety

Attentional bias to threat (ABT) refers to the tendency to more rapidly orient attention to threatening stimuli, as compared to neutral or pleasant stimuli. Issues with the reliability of this phenomenon have been raised and little is currently known about individual differences that may contribute to ABT. This online study aimed to replicate ABT in trait anxiety and identify psychological predictors of ABT using both dot probe and flanker tasks comprising emotional images. Undergraduate students completed various psychological questionnaires, followed by the ABT tasks. Contrary to expectations, faster responses and enhanced accuracy for positive stimuli were found in a low trait anxiety sub-sample (n = 33) in the dot probe task, while overall slower performance among a high trait anxiety sub-sample (n = 34) was found in the flanker task. Higher ratings of state anxiety and stress and lower ratings of calmness were associated with greater flanker ABT scores in the overall sample (N = 111), while higher scores on facets of trait mindfulness and personality were associated with greater dot probe ABT scores. Trait anxiety was not associated with either ABT score. These findings highlight the difficulties replicating ABT in anxious individuals using behavioural tasks and indicate the importance of measuring state and trait psychological experiences when investigating ABT in experimental settings. Further replication of predictors is required.