The role of state anxiety in salience-driven distractor processing: evidence from singleton detection and feature search

Salient but irrelevant distractors automatically capture attention in singleton detection search but not in feature search, due to the different search strategies adopt by observers. While state anxiety has been associated with increased salience-driven capture, it remains unclear whether such effects extend to feature search, which relies more on top-down control. The present study addressed this question using an eye-tracking technique, combining the threat of shock with the singleton detection and feature search tasks. Participants were instructed to execute speeded saccades to the target while ignoring a salient irrelevant distractor. To induce state anxiety, unpredictable, unavoidable, and sporadic shocks were administered during threat blocks, while no shocks were administered during safe blocks. The results showed that threat significantly increased oculomotor capture and dwell time on the salient distractor in the feature search task, but had no effect in the singleton detection task. These findings suggest that state anxiety may selectively impair template-based rejection and disengagement mechanisms required for feature search, whereas purely priority-guided selection during singleton detection leaves little room for additional modulation. Our results highlight that task demands determine how threat-induced state anxiety modulates salience-driven capture.