Negative Emotional States Impair the Active Suppression of Irrelevant Information during the Encoding Phase of Visual Working Memory

Efficient functioning of visual working memory (VWM) relies on the ability to filter out irrelevant information. Recent studies suggest that negative emotional states impair this filtering process; however, the underlying mechanisms-specifically whether this impairment stems from deficits in target selection or distractor suppression-remain insufficiently understood. The present study employed ERPs in combination with a lateralized change detection task to systematically examine how negative emotional state affects information filtering in VWM and its neural underpinnings. Behavioral results confirmed that negative emotional states marginally significantly reduced VWM accuracy. ERP analyses further revealed that whereas target processing (target-elicited N2-posterior-contralateral and contralateral delay activity) remained intact across conditions, distractor processing was significantly altered by negative emotional states. Specifically, under negative emotional states, irrelevant information elicited a more negative N2-posterior-contralateral and a less positive distractor positivity amplitude, indicating that irrelevant information exerted stronger attentional capture and weaker active suppression during the encoding stage. During the maintenance stage, the contralateral delay activity component was observed, suggesting that irrelevant information entered and occupied memory resources. Correlation analyses further demonstrated that stronger subjective negative affect was associated with weaker neural inhibition (distractor positivity), which predicted the extent of distractor storage. In summary, this study indicates that negative emotional state impairs the ability to filter distractors from working memory primarily by disrupting the active suppression of irrelevant information during the encoding stage, rather than by hindering target selection. This failure in inhibitory control allows distractors to intrude into the limited capacity of VWM, thereby degrading overall performance.