Introduction.

The literature has recently shown that emotions interfere with the efficacy of response inhibition. Response inhibition is the process that deliberately suppresses automatic, or dominant responses that are inappropriate to achieve personal goals. Due to the relevance of emotional stimuli for survival, different studies have suggested that the performance of response inhibition can vary depending on the context, that is, in neutral or emotionally salience contexts.

Objective.

The aim of the study was to investigate the functioning of behavioral inhibition in contexts with different emotional temperatures in a large sample of children from 8 to 12 years-old.

Methods and materials.

Inhibition was assessed using an experimental Simon Affective task with emotional and neutral stimuli simulating contexts with high and low emotional salience respectively.

Results and discussion.

Contrary to expectations, the results showed that there were no significant differences in response inhibition depending on the context. The results are discussed in relation to other studies. These results constitute a contribution to the study of the interference of emotional content in children.

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