Dataset for: Positive for verbal, negative for visual? Processing of affective stimuli in verbal and visual working memory

There is an assumption about emotions and WM that verbal WM functions better under positive emotional influence while visuospatial WM functions better under negative emotional influence. We tested whether positive stimuli were processed faster than negative in the verbal 2-back while negative stimuli were processed faster in the visual 2-back. Thirty-eight undergraduates (25 females; M=22±4.06) participated in a study with 2-back task with positively and negatively valenced stimuli in visual and verbal modality. We stress that care was taken to control for many confounds not typically controlled for in emotion/WM studies. For RT, there was a clear valence effect in the verbal WM task, and virtually no valence effect in the visual WM task. The small preference for negative stimuli in visual WM for accuracy was found in no-repetition probes only. No-repetition probes involve unconscious recognition-based automatic memory processes while probes with repetition possibly also require a conscious recollection process. So, there may be a possible dissociation between automatic recognition which favours the processing of negative stimuli and controlled processing which favours positive stimuli. This means that visual is not for negative while verbal is for positive, but it is positive for controlled and negative for automatic.