Vol.:(0123456789) 1 3 Aging Clinical and Experimental Research https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-021-02007-6 ORIGINAL ARTICLE The role of automatic and controlled processes in the positivity efect for older adults Mariateresa Panebianco 1  · Tindara Caprì 1,2,3  · Michela Panebianco 1  · Rosa Angela Fabio 1 Received: 30 August 2021 / Accepted: 15 October 2021 © The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 Abstract Background The positivity efect can be defned as an age-related attentional preference for positive information. The age diferences are due to an attentional bias in which the young focused more intently on the negative stimuli, whereas the older attend to capture positive stimuli. There are two cognitive-emotional models that can explain the positivity efect: the socio-emotional selectivity theory (SST) and the dynamic integration theory (DIT). The SST states that in the older the positivity efect is related to controlled attentional processes, on the opposite, the DIT states that the positivity efect is related to automatic processes. Aims The main aim of the present study was to examine automatic and controlled attentional orienting of young and older adults in the positivity efect. Methods To reach these goals and to verify the generalization of the previous results, we used two experimental paradigms: the dot-probe task and the visual discrimination task with facial stimuli with positive (happy and surprise), negative (fair and angry) and neutral emotional expressions. 50 older and 35 young adults participated in this study. Results The older adults reacted faster to positive emotions than neutral or negative ones. They had similar RTs for the three types of emotions in both automatic and controlled attention. Discussion The fndings are discussed in light of SST and DIT theories. Conclusions This study confrms the positivity efect for the older subjects and support the idea that both automatic and controlled processes play a key role in this efect. Keywords Positivity efect · Automatic processes · Controlled processes · Older Introduction The positivity efect can be defned as an age-related atten- tional preference for positive information [1, 2]. Relative to younger adults, older adults attend to focus on positive stimuli more than negative ones [3–5]. This efect has been explained by two theories: the socio-emotional selectivity theory (SST) [1, 6–8] and the dynamic integration theory (DIT) [9–11]. The SST is a life-span theory of motivation and stated that age-related changes in goals are adaptive, refecting the reality that changing time horizons and ulti- mately mortality impose. When the future is perceived as long and nebulous, as it typically is in younger people, the goals related to gathering information and expanding horizons are prioritized over emotional gratifcation. When the future is perceived as short, as it typically is in older, the goals related to emotional satisfaction and meaning are prioritized over goals associated with long-term rewards. Thus, for younger adults is more adaptive focus on nega- tive information over positive one, whereas for the older is more adaptive focus on positive information. Several stud- ies confrm the assumptions of SST, demonstrating that the positivity efect emerges from a combination of heightened processing of positive and reduced processing of negative information [1, 6, 12]. Moreover, the SST assumes that the positivity efect involves controlled attentional processes * Tindara Caprì tcapri@unime.it 1 Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, University of Messina, Via Bivona, 98100 Messina, Italy 2 National Research Council of Italy (CNR), Institute for Biomedical Research and Innovation (IRIB), 98164 Messina, Italy 3 LuxAI S.A, Boulevard Prince Henri 35, 1724 Luxembourg, Luxembourg