Validation of an emotional stop-signal task to probe individual differences in emotional response inhibition: Relationships with positive and negative urgency

Abstract

Performance on an emotional stop-signal task designed to assess emotional response inhibition has been associated with Negative Urgency and psychopathology, particularly self-injurious behaviors. Indeed, difficulty inhibiting prepotent negative responses to aversive stimuli on the emotional stop-signal task (i.e. poor negative emotional response inhibition) partially explains the association between Negative Urgency and non-suicidal self-injury. Here, we combine existing data sets from clinical (hospitalised psychiatric inpatients) and non-clinical (community/student participants) samples aged 18–65 years ( N = 450) to examine the psychometric properties of this behavioural task and evaluate hypotheses that emotional stop-signal task metrics relate to distinct impulsive traits among participants who also completed the UPPS-P ( n = 223). We specifically predicted associations between worse negative emotional response inhibition (i.e. commission errors during stop-signal trials representing negative reactions to unpleasant images) and Negative Urgency, whereas commission errors to positive stimuli – reflecting worse positive emotional response inhibition – would relate to Positive Urgency. Results support the emotional stop-signal task’s convergent and discriminant validity: as hypothesised, poor negative emotional response inhibition was specifically associated with Negative Urgency and no other impulsive traits on the UPPS-P. However, we did not find the hypothesised association between positive emotional response inhibition and Positive Urgency. Correlations between emotional stop-signal task performance and self-report measures were the modest, similar to other behavioural tasks. Participants who completed the emotional stop-signal task twice ( n = 61) additionally provide preliminary evidence for test–retest reliability. Together, findings suggest adequate reliability and validity of the emotional stop-signal task to derive candidate behavioural markers of neurocognitive functioning associated with Negative Urgency and psychopathology.