Negative self-referential processing is associated with genetic variation in the serotonin transporter-linked polymorphic region (5-HTTLPR): Evidence from two independent studies

The current research examined whether carriers of the short 5-HTTLPR allele (in SLC6A4), who have been shown to selectively attend to negative information, exhibit a bias towards negative self-referent processing. The self-referent encoding task (SRET) was used to measure self-referential processing of positive and negative adjectives. Ratcliff’s diffusion model isolated and extracted decision-making components from SRET responses and reaction times. Across the initial (N = 183) and replication (N = 137) studies, results indicated that short 5-HTTLPR allele carriers more easily categorized negative adjectives as self-referential (i.e., higher drift rate). Further, drift rate was associated with recall of negative self-referential stimuli. Findings across both studies provide further evidence that genetic variation may contribute to the etiology of negatively biased processing of self-referent information. Large scale studies examining the genetic contributions to negative self-referent processing may be warranted.