Information processing is critical in enabling the
organism to adaptively act in an environment containing both
dangers and opportunities. The general assumption underlying my
project is that interactively affect, cognition, and action
constitute an adaptive regulatory process that ultimately serves
survival functions. In this context, the immediate evaluation of
the environment has a critical adaptive function, since the
regulation of action (e.g. approach or avoidance) depends on this.
The environment is however rich and complex and given our limited
attentional capacity only a subset of stimulus characteristics can
be attended to at any one point in time. Valence has been shown to
constitute such a stimulus characteristic that can also be
identified without conscious processing. It is therefore not
surprising that the automatic allocation of attention to valenced
stimuli (positive vs. negative) is a central focus of interest in
social cognition. It constitutes a fast and efficient global
screening mechanism directing the organism’s attention to a limited
number of important and easily detectable features of the
environment. My research is concerned with the investigation of the
processes involved in the detection of stimuli varying in valence
and self-relevance and the regulation of such detection
processes.
Jostmann, N. B., Koole, S. L., Van der Wulp, N. Y.,
& Fockenberg, D. A. (In press).Subliminal Affect Regulation: The Moderating Role of
Action versus State Orientation. European
Psychologist
Van den Berg, A.E., Koole, S.L., & Van der Wulp,
N.Y. (2003).Environmental preferenceand restoration: (How) are they related? Journal
of Environmental Psychology, 23, 135-146
