Psychology

Various human systems have been researched with the aim of improving knowledge on human bodily function.  Neuroscience, understanding of human cognition and psychological reactions are complicated by the fact that there are many variables to be considered when psychoanalysing an individual.  Human short term memory which affects the level of attention has gained increased awareness due to the close connection between numerous psychiatric conditions and short term memory lapses.  Anxiety is a symptom that is common to a number of known psychiatric conditions.  The close manifestation of attention deficit and the levels of anxiety have attracted interest from researchers.  This paper seeks to determine the effects that anxiety has on attention and whether their interaction can be explained by the Baddleys model of working memory.

Discussion
Attention is an area that has greatly been centred on by researchers who have developed findings showing the existence of a multitude of factors influencing the distribution of attention.  Variation in the levels of attention can be attributed to past experiences, personality disposition and knowledge levels.  Recent studies show that anxiety could be influential on the allocation of attention in cases where an attack is anticipated as well as in dealing with a stimulus that poses a threat. Clinically anxious participants have been shown to significantly shift attention to threat words.  This is one of the many examples that relay a connection between attention and the levels of anxiety.

Different approaches have been adopted in analysing the effects of anxiety on attention which is a manifestation of the short term or rather working memory.  Studies seeking to determine the link between anxiety and working memory focus more on the effects of the emotional state.  Anxiety is considered an emotional state which may either be influenced by positive or negative events.  Elation and depression have been shown to be associated with significant levels of anxiety.  A person in a negative or foul mood is less likely to perform well in cognitive task for instance calculation.  This phenomenon has been explained as a result of the effects that the poor emotional state has on working memory and attention.  Negative moods can impede performance by promoting intrusive thoughts that may distract individuals from tasks.  Though there is a general agreement that the emotional state and anxiety in general affects the levels of attention, studies show that they impact differently on verbal and visuo-spatial memory performance.  Emotional content is shown to be highly influential on the information that is paid attention to.  Emotional stimuli results in the grabbing of attention of a participant.  These findings are in line with multiple studies that posit emotional stimuli are processed almost automatically.  However, there is evidence of human ability to consciously process forms of anxiety for instance fear related emotional stimulus without any form of conscious awareness or attention.  This is attributed to the activation effect of emotional stimuli on the amygdala even in cases where individuals lack awareness on the existence of information.

The visible bias in dealing with emotional anxiety relative to non-emotional anxiety is responsible for the different effects it has on the levels of working memory performance.  The automatic prioritisation of emotional content as compared to information that is not laden with emotion facilitates retention of emotional information which results in the practically observed performance enhancement via improved attention in a case where the cause of anxiety is emotionally laden.  However, there are exceptions that result from the nature of the task requirements.  There is a high likelihood for improved attention due to anxiety which divert ones attention from other aspects of performance.  Anxiety resulting from emotional stimulus results in focussing on the dimensions of a task that convey emotional salience which results in diversion from other stimulus dimensions.  The stroop phenomenon which is manifested in delayed identification of the ink colour used in writing emotional words relative to that used in writing neutral words is an example of a case where anxiety results in reduced performance or attention.  Thus the impact of anxiety on attention could be affected by the nature of task that one has to undertake.  Moreover, humans have the ability to deliberately or consciously channel attention in case of stimuli laden with emotions due to distinctiveness or personal relevance.  Such intentional processes affect the working memory performance or attention.  Therefore, the specific task characteristics determine whether additional processing of emotional stimuli facilitates or impairs the levels of attention. Anxiety results in cognitive interference which may be constructive or destructive depending on the nature of the task being analysed.  The importance of the test material on the levels of attention is brought out clearly in the fact that high test-anxious people report intrusive thoughts and reduced performance in timed cognitive tests whereas they record higher attention in tests of free recall of memorised material.

There are various theories and models that have been formulated to develop a thorough grasp of the effects of anxiety on attention.  One theory established for the relationship between test anxiety and lower cognitive performance asserts that the latter is affected by the size of the working memory.  In a case where one encounters multiple irrelevant thoughts such as worries, the capacity of the working memory is highly reduced.  The interference model of anxiety asserts that emotions, fears and anxieties significantly affect recall which results in degradation of performance.  This is validated by the fact that any cognitive task requires the existence of prior knowledge thus the ability to recall impacts considerably on performance.  However, these theories based on interference are only applicable in cases where the tasks are complex and therefore require large working memory capacity.  Further studies show that evaluation significantly affects the relationship between anxiety and attention.  High levels of anxiety results in significant poorer performance in a case where a test is being evaluated relative to game like scenarios.

The model of working memory is a significant development in trying to conceptualise the multiple complexities underpinning the relationship between the levels of anxiety and attention. It is noteworthy that the model which was developed in 1974 is aimed at developing an accurate abstraction of short term memory.  Though alternative models have since been developed, Baddeleys model remains one of the most widely adopted abstractions in analysing short term memory.  It is worth noting that attention is a manifestation of high levels of short term memory.  To a large degree the relationship between anxiety and attention can be described by Baddeleys model.  The original Baddeleys model was made up of a central executive and two buffers referred to as the phonological loop and visuo-spatial sketchpad.  The buffers which are short term memory locations deal with verbal and visuo-spatial content.

Selective attention under Baddeleys model plays a vital role in the efficiency of the working memory which affects attention.  The aspect of selection can to a large degree explain the differences in attention to emotional content due to personal preferences and past experiences.  Since recall in the short term is affected by the availability of data in the short term memory locations, emotions and anxiety in general can affect the nature of interaction between buffers and the central executive.  Emotions for instance anxiety has a powerful effect on the information that is selected or suppressed in the long term memory.  Attention is affected by the existence of information in the short term memory thus presenting people the ability to influence the nature of information that they want to store.  Another important assertion underpinning the observed differential interaction between anxiety and attention is that the human person has no influence on the working of the central executive.  Emotional responses in most cases are out of a persons control and are in response to an external stimulus.  The fact that the human person does not influence the interaction between the central executive and the two loops implies that attention cannot be accurately predetermined. The unconscious improved or reduced performance as a result of anxiety can be explained by this assertion.

Since every action requires interaction between the central executive and either loop, the existence of multiple thoughts and distraction due to emotional disturbance or anxiety may result in reduced working capacity.  Reduced performance or attention due to anxiety can therefore be explained by the working mechanism of the Baddeleys model.  On the other hand, increased performance due to anxiety may be a manifestation of selective information and personal experiences.  The stroop phenomenon which serves to relay the importance of the nature of task in determining the relationship between anxiety and attention reveals that different mechanisms affect short term memory thus attention.  Delayed realisation of the ink colour due to emotional content of writing implies that meaning of the words and articulation of the colours are recalled via different mechanisms.  The phonological and visuo-spatial sketchpad explains the different mechanism involves in the stroop phenomenon.

Conclusion
The effects of anxiety on attention vary greatly.  Though the effect of anxiety on attention is beyond doubt, the exact direction of the effect varies depending on the nature of the stimuli, past experiences and even the nature of an individual.  The exact scenarios being referenced to a great extent affects the degree of the effect of anxiety on attention.  Game-like scenarios result in reduced effect of anxiety on attention whereas exam-like conditions are associated with heightened effect of anxiety on attention.  The varied theories for instance cognitive interference that have been developed to hypothesize the nature of relationship between anxiety and attention in complex tasks can be sufficiently explained by the Baddeleys model.  This model further highlights selection as an influential factor on the working memory and highlights the effect of context on the relationship between anxiety and attention.  In general, the Baddeleys model of working memory can explain numerous observation and findings on the effects of anxiety on attention.