scholarly journals Neural Substrates Underlying Learning-Related Changes of the Unconditioned Fear Response

2013 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimberly H. Wood ◽  
Dystany Kuykendall ◽  
Lawrence W. Ver Hoef ◽  
David C. Knight
Keyword(s):  
Associative Learning ◽  
Pavlovian Conditioning ◽  
Emotional Response ◽  
Negative Relationship ◽  
Neural Substrates ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Anterior Insula ◽  
Fmri Signal ◽  
Posterior Insula ◽  
The Brain

The ability to predict an impending threat during Pavlovian conditioning diminishes the emotional response that is produced once the threat is encountered. Diminution of the threat response appears to be mediated by somewhat independent associative learning and expectancy-related processes. Therefore, the present study was designed to better understand the neural mechanisms that support associative learning processes, independent of expectancy, that influence the emotional response to a threat. Healthy volunteers took part in a Pavlovian conditioning procedure during which trait anxiety, expectation of the unconditioned stimulus (UCS), skin conductance response (SCR), and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) signal were assessed. The results showed no evidence for associative learning that was independent of expectation. Threat-related SCR expression was diminished on predictable trials vs. unpredictable trials of the UCS (i.e. conditioned UCR diminution). Similar to SCR, conditioned UCR diminution was observed within the left dorsolateral PFC, dorsomedial PFC, ventromedial PFC, and left anterior insula. In contrast, potentiation of the threat-related fMRI signal response was observed within left dorsolateral PFC, inferior parietal lobule (IPL), and posterior insula. A negative relationship was observed between UCS expectancy and UCR expression within the dorsomedial PFC, ventromedial PFC, and anterior insula. Finally, the anticipatory fMRI signal responses within the PFC, posterior cingulate, and amygdala showed an inverse relationship with threat-related activation within the brain regions that showed UCR diminution. The current findings suggest that the PFC and amygdala support learning-related processes that impact the magnitude of the emotional response to a threat.

scholarly journals Neural Substrates of Social Status Inference: Roles of Medial Prefrontal Cortex and Superior Temporal Sulcus

2014 ◽  
Vol 26 (5) ◽  
pp. 1131-1140 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malia Mason ◽  
Joe C. Magee ◽  
Susan T. Fiske
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Neural Substrates ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Social Interdependence ◽  
Medial Pfc ◽  
State Inference ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Track Status

The negotiation of social order is intimately connected to the capacity to infer and track status relationships. Despite the foundational role of status in social cognition, we know little about how the brain constructs status from social interactions that display it. Although emerging cognitive neuroscience reveals that status judgments depend on the intraparietal sulcus, a brain region that supports the comparison of targets along a quantitative continuum, we present evidence that status judgments do not necessarily reduce to ranking targets along a quantitative continuum. The process of judging status also fits a social interdependence analysis. Consistent with third-party perceivers judging status by inferring whose goals are dictating the terms of the interaction and who is subordinating their desires to whom, status judgments were associated with increased recruitment of medial pFC and STS, brain regions implicated in mental state inference.

scholarly journals Mapping Pavlovian Conditioning Effects on the Brain: Blocking, Contiguity, and Excitatory Effects

2001 ◽  
Vol 86 (2) ◽  
pp. 809-823 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dirk Jones ◽  
F. Gonzalez-Lima
Keyword(s):  
Pavlovian Conditioning ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Brain Activity ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Blocking Effect ◽  
Anterior Cingulate ◽  
Caudate Putamen ◽  
Fdg Uptake ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Previous Learning

Pavlovian conditioning effects on the brain were investigated by mapping rat brain activity with fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) autoradiography. The goal was to map the effects of the same tone after blocking or eliciting a conditioned emotional response (CER). In the tone-blocked group, previous learning about a light blocked a CER to the tone. In the tone-excitor group, the same pairings of tone with shock US resulted in a CER to the tone in the absence of previous learning about the light. A third group showed no CER after pseudorandom presentations of these stimuli. Brain systems involved in the various associative effects of Pavlovian conditioning were identified, and their functional significance was interpreted in light of previous FDG studies. Three conditioning effects were mapped: 1) blocking effects: FDG uptake was lower in medial prefrontal cortex and higher in spinal trigeminal and cuneate nuclei in the tone-blocked group relative to the tone-excitor group. 2) Contiguity effects: relative to pseudorandom controls, similar FDG uptake increases in the tone-blocked and -excitor groups were found in auditory regions (inferior colliculus and cortex), hippocampus (CA1), cerebellum, caudate putamen, and solitary nucleus. Contiguity effects may be due to tone-shock pairings common to the tone-blocked and -excitor groups rather than their different CER. And 3) excitatory effects: FDG uptake increases limited to the tone-excitor group occurred in a circuit linked to the CER, including insular and anterior cingulate cortex, vertical diagonal band nucleus, anterior hypothalamus, and caudoventral caudate putamen. This study provided the first large-scale map of brain regions underlying the Kamin blocking effect on conditioning. In particular, the results suggest that suppression of prefrontal activity and activation of unconditioned stimulus pathways are important neural substrates of the Kamin blocking effect.

Affective Neuroscience: Past, Present, and Future

2009 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 355-368 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Dalgleish ◽  
Barnaby D. Dunn ◽  
Dean Mobbs
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Neural Substrates ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Historical Overview ◽  
Affective Neuroscience ◽  
Future Directions ◽  
Current State ◽  
State Of Research ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Made In

The discipline of affective neuroscience is concerned with the underlying neural substrates of emotion and mood. This review presents an historical overview of the pioneering work in affective neuroscience of James and Lange, Cannon and Bard, and Hess, Papez, and MacLean before summarizing the current state of research on the brain regions identified by these seminal researchers. We also discuss the more recent strides made in the field of affective neuroscience. A final section considers different hypothetical organizations of affective neuroanatomy and highlights future directions for the discipline.

scholarly journals The Insula: A Stimulating Island of the Brain

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 1533
Author(s):  
Inès Rachidi ◽  
Lorella Minotti ◽  
Guillaume Martin ◽  
Dominique Hoffmann ◽  
Julien Bastin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Anterior Insula ◽  
Homologous Region ◽  
Seizure Onset ◽  
Functional Brain Mapping ◽  
Axonal Conduction ◽  
Seizure Onset Zone ◽  
Clinical Responses ◽  
History Of ◽  
Posterior Insula ◽  
The Brain

Direct cortical stimulation (DCS) in epilepsy surgery patients has a long history of functional brain mapping and seizure triggering. Here, we review its findings when applied to the insula in order to map the insular functions, evaluate its local and distant connections, and trigger seizures. Clinical responses to insular DCS are frequent and diverse, showing a partial segregation with spatial overlap, including a posterior somatosensory, auditory, and vestibular part, a central olfactory-gustatory region, and an anterior visceral and cognitive-emotional portion. The study of cortico-cortical evoked potentials (CCEPs) has shown that the anterior (resp. posterior) insula has a higher connectivity rate with itself than with the posterior (resp. anterior) insula, and that both the anterior and posterior insula are closely connected, notably between the homologous insular subdivisions. All insular gyri show extensive and complex ipsilateral and contralateral extra-insular connections, more anteriorly for the anterior insula and more posteriorly for the posterior insula. As a rule, CCEPs propagate first and with a higher probability around the insular DCS site, then to the homologous region, and later to more distal regions with fast cortico-cortical axonal conduction delays. Seizures elicited by insular DCS have rarely been specifically studied, but their rate does not seem to differ from those of other DCS studies. They are mainly provoked from the insular seizure onset zone but can also be triggered by stimulating intra- and extra-insular early propagation zones. Overall, in line with the neuroimaging studies, insular DCS studies converge on the view that the insula is a multimodal functional hub with a fast propagation of information, whose organization helps understand where insular seizures start and how they propagate.

scholarly journals Damage to the right insula disrupts the perception of affective touch

eLife ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise P Kirsch ◽  
Sahba Besharati ◽  
Christina Papadaki ◽  
Laura Crucianelli ◽  
Sara Bertagnoli ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Right Hemisphere ◽  
Anterior Insula ◽  
Affective Touch ◽  
Cortical Organization ◽  
Touch Perception ◽  
Posterior Insula ◽  
The Right ◽  
Tactile System ◽  
The Brain

Specific, peripheral C-tactile afferents contribute to the perception of tactile pleasure, but the brain areas involved in their processing remain debated. We report the first human lesion study on the perception of C-tactile touch in right hemisphere stroke patients (N = 59), revealing that right posterior and anterior insula lesions reduce tactile, contralateral and ipsilateral pleasantness sensitivity, respectively. These findings corroborate previous imaging studies regarding the role of the posterior insula in the perception of affective touch. However, our findings about the crucial role of the anterior insula for ipsilateral affective touch perception open new avenues of enquiry regarding the cortical organization of this tactile system.

A Model of Brain Function: Its Implications for Psychiatric Research

1986 ◽  
Vol 148 (4) ◽  
pp. 357-362 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce E. Wexler
Keyword(s):  
Clinical Practice ◽  
Brain Function ◽  
Neural Substrates ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Integrated Model ◽  
Psychiatric Research ◽  
Clinical Syndromes ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Existing Data

Much current research in psychiatry proceeds in the absence of an integrated model of brain function. It is based instead on the effort to relate clinical syndromes to single, localised abnormalities in the brain. Such an approach is inconsistent with existing data, inadequate for linking research findings with clinical practice, and, probably, fundamentally misdirected. A model of brain function is presented that is based on Luria's notion of cerebral functional systems and on the proposition that the neural substrates of emotion are those processes that integrate different brain regions. Some of the implications of this model for research are discussed.

scholarly journals Changes in metabolites in the brain of patients with fibromyalgia after treatment with an NMDA receptor antagonist

2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (6) ◽  
pp. 408-419 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicolas Fayed ◽  
Barbara Oliván ◽  
Yolanda Lopez del Hoyo ◽  
Eva Andrés ◽  
Mari Cruz Perez-Yus ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Function ◽  
Magnetic Resonance ◽  
Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy ◽  
Clinical Global Impression ◽  
Anterior Insula ◽  
Resonance Spectroscopy ◽  
Posterior Cingulate ◽  
Posterior Insula ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Brain

The aims of this work were to evaluate whether the treatment of patients with fibromyalgia with memantine is associated with significant changes in metabolite concentrations in the brain, and to explore any changes in clinical outcome measures. Magnetic resonance spectroscopy was performed of the right anterior and posterior insula, both hippocampi and the posterior cingulate cortex. Questionnaires on pain, anxiety, depression, global function, quality of life and cognitive impairment were used. Ten patients were studied at baseline and after three months of treatment with memantine. Significant increases were observed in the following areas: N-acetylaspartate (4.47 at baseline vs. 4.71 at three months, p = 0.02) and N-acetylaspartate+N-acetylaspartate glutamate in the left hippocampus (5.89 vs. 5.98; p = 0.007); N-acetylaspartate+N-acetylaspartate glutamate in the right hippocampus (5.31 vs 5.79; p = 0.01) and the anterior insula (7.56 vs. 7.70; p = 0.033); glutamate+glutamine/creatine ratio in the anterior insula (2.03 vs. 2.17; p = 0.022) and the posterior insula (1.77 vs. 2.00; p = 0.004); choline/creatine ratio in the posterior cingulate (0.18 vs. 0.19; p = 0.023); and creatine in the right hippocampus (3.60 vs. 3.85; p = 0.007). At the three-month follow-up, memantine improved cognitive function assessed by the Cognition Mini-Exam (31.50, SD = 2.95 vs. 34.40, SD = 0.6; p = 0.005), depression measured by the Hamilton Depression Scale (7.70, SD = 0.81 vs. 7.56, SD = 0.68; p = 0.042) and severity of illness measured by the Clinical Global Impression severity scale (5.79, SD = 0.96 vs. 5.31, SD = 1.12; p = 0.007). Depression, clinical global impression and cognitive function showed improvement with memantine. Magnetic resonance spectroscopy could be useful in monitoring response to the pharmacological treatment of fibromyalgia.

Functional MRI

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Functional Mri ◽  
Resting State ◽  
Brain Activity ◽  
Low Frequency ◽  
Resting State Fmri ◽  
Blood Oxygen Level Dependent ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Functional Brain Imaging ◽  
Fmri Signal ◽  
The Brain

Functional MRI with BOLD (Blood Oxygen Level Dependent) imaging is one of the commonly used modalities for studying brain function in neuroscience. The underlying source of the BOLD fMRI signal is the variation in oxyhemoglobin to deoxyhemoglobin ratio at the site of neuronal activity in the brain. fMRI is mostly used to map out the location and intensity of brain activity that correlate with mental activities. In recent years, a new approach to fMRI was developed that is called resting-state fMRI. The fMRI signal from this method does not require the brain to perform any goal-directed task; it is acquired with the subject at rest. It was discovered that there are low-frequency fluctuations in the fMRI signal in the brain at rest. The signals originate from spatially distinct functionally related brain regions but exhibit coherent time-synchronous fluctuations. Several of the networks have been identified and are called resting-state networks. These networks represent the strength of the functional connectivity between distinct functionally related brain regions and have been used as imaging markers of various neurological and psychiatric diseases. Resting-state fMRI is also ideally suited for functional brain imaging in disorders of consciousness and in subjects under anesthesia. This book provides a review of the basic principles of fMRI (signal sources, acquisition methods, and data analysis) and its potential clinical applications.

scholarly journals Laughter is in the air: involvement of key nodes of the emotional motor system in the anticipation of tickling

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (8) ◽  
pp. 837-847 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elise Wattendorf ◽  
Birgit Westermann ◽  
Klaus Fiedler ◽  
Simone Ritz ◽  
Annetta Redmann ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Sensory Processing ◽  
Anterior Insula ◽  
Anterior Cingulate ◽  
Functional Magnetic Resonance ◽  
Resonance Imaging ◽  
Periaqueductal Gray Matter ◽  
Internal Globus Pallidus ◽  
Posterior Insula ◽  
Anticipatory Activity ◽  
The Brain

Abstract In analogy to the appreciation of humor, that of tickling is based upon the re-interpretation of an anticipated emotional situation. Hence, the anticipation of tickling contributes to the final outburst of ticklish laughter. To localize the neuronal substrates of this process, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was conducted on 31 healthy volunteers. The state of anticipation was simulated by generating an uncertainty respecting the onset of manual foot tickling. Anticipation was characterized by an augmented fMRI signal in the anterior insula, the hypothalamus, the nucleus accumbens and the ventral tegmental area, as well as by an attenuated one in the internal globus pallidus. Furthermore, anticipatory activity in the anterior insula correlated positively with the degree of laughter that was produced during tickling. These findings are consistent with an encoding of the expected emotional consequences of tickling and suggest that early regulatory mechanisms influence, automatically, the laughter circuitry at the level of affective and sensory processing. Tickling activated not only those regions of the brain that were involved during anticipation, but also the posterior insula, the anterior cingulate cortex and the periaqueductal gray matter. Sequential or combined anticipatory and tickling-related neuronal activities may adjust emotional and sensorimotor pathways in preparation for the impending laughter response.

scholarly journals Distributed and Multifaceted Effects of Threat and Safety

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Dinavahi V. P. S. Murty ◽  
Songtao Song ◽  
Kelly Morrow ◽  
Jongwan Kim ◽  
Kesong Hu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Temporal Evolution ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Anterior Insula ◽  
Important Goal ◽  
Bed Nucleus ◽  
Threat Processing ◽  
Fmri Study ◽  
Response Profiles ◽  
Anxious Apprehension ◽  
The Brain

Abstract In the present fMRI study, we examined how anxious apprehension is processed in the human brain. A central goal of the study was to test the prediction that a subset of brain regions would exhibit sustained response profiles during threat periods, including the anterior insula, a region implicated in anxiety disorders. A second important goal was to evaluate the responses in the amygdala and the bed nucleus of the stria terminals, regions that have been suggested to be involved in more transient and sustained threat, respectively. A total of 109 participants performed an experiment in which they encountered “threat” or “safe” trials lasting approximately 16 sec. During the former, they experienced zero to three highly unpleasant electrical stimulations, whereas in the latter, they experienced zero to three benign electrical stimulations (not perceived as unpleasant). The timing of the stimulation during trials was randomized, and as some trials contained no stimulation, stimulation delivery was uncertain. We contrasted responses during threat and safe trials that did not contain electrical stimulation, but only the potential that unpleasant (threat) or benign (safe) stimulation could occur. We employed Bayesian multilevel analysis to contrast responses to threat and safe trials in 85 brain regions implicated in threat processing. Our results revealed that the effect of anxious apprehension is distributed across the brain and that the temporal evolution of the responses is quite varied, including more transient and more sustained profiles, as well as signal increases and decreases with threat.

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