Does oxytocin lead to emotional interference during a working memory paradigm?

Marieke S. Tollenaar, M. Ruissen, B. M. Elzinga, E. R. A. de Bruijn

Oxytocin administration may increase attention to emotional information. We hypothesized that this augmented emotional processing might in turn lead to interference on concurrent cognitive tasks. To test this hypothesis, we examined whether oxytocin administration would lead to heightened emotional interference during a working memory paradigm. Additionally, moderating effects of childhood maltreatment were explored. Seventy-eight healthy males received 24 IU of intranasal oxytocin or placebo in a randomized placebo-controlled double-blind between-subjects study. A working memory task was performed during which neutral, positive, and negative distractors were presented. The main outcome observed was that oxytocin did not enhance interference by emotional information during the working memory task. There was a non-significant trend for oxytocin to slow down performance irrespective of distractor valence, while accuracy was unaffected. Exploratory analyses showed that childhood maltreatment was related to lower overall accuracy, but in the placebo condition only. However, the maltreated group sample size was very small precluding any conclusions on its moderating effect. Despite oxytocin's previously proposed role in enhanced emotional processing, no proof was found that this would lead to reduced performance on a concurrent cognitive task. The routes by which oxytocin exerts its effects on cognitive and social-emotional processes remain to be fully elucidated.