Prefrontal asymmetry predicts affect, but not beliefs about affect

Self-reported emotional feelings are easily biased by situational or identity-related beliefs. Such biases vary as a function of memory. Recent memories draw more on veridical felt affective experience whereas distant memories draw more on situational or identity-related biases. For this study, frontal EEG asymmetry was used to predict feeling- versus belief-based self-reports of freshmen year homesickness in college freshmen and sophomores. Relatively greater right frontal EEG asymmetry predicted greater feeling-based, experiential reports of freshman year homesickness, whereas no associations were found between frontal EEG asymmetry and belief-based, retrospective reports of freshman year homesickness. These results support the status of frontal EEG asymmetry as a measure of affective vulnerability and suggest that links between frontal EEG asymmetry and self-reported affect are detectable to the extent that self-reports capture current emotional feelings and not situational or identity-related beliefs about what one ought to have felt.

► Biases in self-report have led to controversy in psychophysiological research. ► We compare associations between EEG asymmetry and current versus retrospective affect. ► EEG asymmetry predicts current affect, but not beliefs about affect. ► Implications for interpreting associations are discussed.