مدولاسیون یادگیری عاطفی: فرصتی برای شرطی سازی ارزیابانه؟

Two experiments assessed whether human affective learning is sensitive to occasion setting. The first experiment (N = 18) employed a within-subjects, sequential feature positive design (X → A+/A−). Modulation of blink startle, an index of affective learning, was larger during A+ than during A−, suggesting that participants had learned a modulatory relationship. Experiment 2 (N = 32) assessed whether the feature also acquired conditioned valence in a between-subjects design. One group received sequential feature positive training (X → A+/A−), and a second group was trained in a sequential feature negative design (X → A−/A+). Startle modulation during the feature was larger in the sequential feature positive group than in the sequential feature negative group. The results are interpreted to suggest the presence of modulated affective learning to the target concurrent with simple affective learning to the feature.