Competitive trait anxiety impacts the neural preparation of prepotent response inhibition:Evidence from ERP.

Attentional control theory(ACT) deciphers how anxiety influences performance from executive function perspective and proposes that anxiety interferes with the inhibition function. Previous research has adopted ACT to interpret behaviors in the competitive sport area and revealed that competitive trait anxiety interfered with prepotent response inhibition which constitutes important component of the inhibition function and is also critical for athletic performance. However, the neural mechanism underlining competitive anxiety-performance relationship was unclear. It was hypothesized that competitive trait anxiety would impair the preparation of prepotent response inhibition. 26 participants were recruited and allocated into competitive trait anxiety high score and low score groups according to their marks on Pre-competition Emotion Scale-Trait 32×6(which is good measurement for competitive trait anxiety in Chinese culture), and both groups performed the pro-and anti-saccade tasks reflecting prepotent response inhibition function. We analyzed the Event Related Potential(ERP) in the preparation period(the-100∼0ms epoch) and found a negative potential in the frontal and central areas during the preparation period in the low score group, whereas the potential was smaller in the high score group. The findings suggest that competitive trait anxiety impairs efficiency of inhibition function and this negative effect is due to under-preparation of inhibition, which partially supports the application of attentional control theory in explaining competitive anxiety in sport psychology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]