RIGHT-HEMISPHERE SENSITIVITY TO FEEDBACK

The present studies sought to determine whether feedback-related emotional states influence perceptual and/or response processes within the right hemisphere. The task involved the presentation of a positive, neutral or negative feedback signal followed by a target in the left (LVF) or right (RVF) visual field which was spatially compatible or incompatible with its assigned response. The first two studies demonstrated that when a LVF target required a left-hand response, RTs were delayed following negative feedback and facilitated following positive feedback. These effects occurred when the target followed the feedback signal by either 100 or 500 msec, and were evident when the response selection was based on either the target's spatial location or its form. Experiment 3 showed that these feedback effects disappeared when verbal information conveyed the appropriate response. These findings indicate that feedback-related emotional processes modulate sensory-response translation processes within the right hemisphere.