Anxiety, a negative emotional and motivational state under a threat situation, is closely related to attention control. On this basis, Eysenck et al. proposed the anxiety control theory which claims that anxiety affects not only the stimulus-driven and target-oriented attention system, but also the suppression and transfer functions of the central executive system. This article will introduce the origin, development, core viewpoint and the main paradigms of the attention control theory in order to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the theory and provide reference for future research.