Wenhai  Zhang
Jiamei   Lu
Neuroimaging research has determined that the neural correlates of automatic emotion regulation (AER)
include the anterior cingulate cortex.However, the corresponding time course remains unknown. In the
current study, we collected event-related potentials (ERPs) from 20 healthy volunteers during a judgment
of the gender of emotional faces in a cued Go/Nogo task.The results indicate that Go-N2 amplitudes and
latencies following positive and negative faces decreased more than those following neutral faces;Nogo-
N2 amplitudes and latencies did not vary with valence. Moreover,positive and negative faces rompted higher  P3  amplitudes and shorter P3 latencies than neutral faces in both Go and Nogo trials.These obser-
vations suggest that in the executive processes,Go-N2 reflects top-down attention toward emotions,
while Go-P3 reflects only motivated attention; in the  inhibitory  processes, Nogo-N2 reflects cognitiv
conflict monitoring, while Nogo-P3 overlaps with the automatic response inhibition of emotions. These
observations imply that AER can  modulate early ERP components, and both Go-N2 and Nogo-P3 can  be
used  as  electrophysiological   indices   of   AER.