Search

Two experiments were conducted to determine if the right hemisphere (RH) plays a central role in understanding sarcasm. In Experiment 1, 48 participants completed a target detection task using dichotically presented phrases that were sincere (message compatible), sarcastic (conflicting semantic and prosodic message), or neutral (no emotional prosody). Sarcastic phrases presented to the left ear (LE)/RH produced faster response times than sarcastic phrases presented to the right ear/left hemisphere. Accuracy results indicated an overall LE/RH advantage for detecting both sarcastic and sincere phrases. Experiment 2 utilized the same task with the addition of event-related potential recording. There was a reliable N400 seen in response to the sarcastic phrases, but only with LE/RH presentation. These results suggest that the RH is particularly sensitive to the mismatch between semantic and prosodic information characterized by sarcasm. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Depression has been associated with task-relevant increased attention toward negative information, reduced attention toward positive information, or reduced inhibition of task-irrelevant negative information. This study employed behavioural and psychophysiological measures (event-related potentials; ERP) to examine whether groups with risk factors for depression (past depression, current dysphoria) would show attentional biases or inhibitory deficits related to viewing facial expressions. In oddball task blocks, young adult participants responded to an infrequently presented target emotion (e.g., sad) and inhibited responses to an infrequently presented distracter emotion (e.g., happy) in the context of frequently presented neutral stimuli. Previous depression was uniquely associated with greater P3 ERP amplitude following sad targets, reflecting a selective attention bias. Also, dysphoric individuals less effectively inhibited responses to sad distracters than non-dysphoric individuals according to behavioural data, but not psychophysiological data. Results suggest that depression risk may be most reliably characterised by increased attention toward others' depressive facial emotion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chairs: Ruth Ann Atchley & Jack B. Nitschke Presenters: Brian F. O'Donnell, Ruth Ann Atchley, Jack B. Nitschke, Deanna M. Barch Discussant: John J. B. Allen [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]