Lecture week 9 - Emotion 2

Question 1

evidence answering the question:

Is emotion inborn?

Answer 1

• trait emotionality is moderately heritable (40- 60%; Bouchard & Loehlin, 2001), but the relations between trait emotionality and genetic variants have only small effect sizes (Sen et al., 2004)
• While emotionality-related brain metabolic measures have not been shown to be heritable (Glahn et al., 2007), specific genetic variants have been found to be associated with reward and threat processing respectively in the brain (Nikolova et al., 2016)
  –> However, these findings could be a result of gene-environment interactions

Question 2

brain structure early emotion scientists identified to be underlying emotion

Answer 2

limbic system

Question 3

what is the limbic system?

Answer 3

a collection of subcortical structures underneath the cerebral cortex and above the brainstem, and includes the thalamus, hypothalamus, hippocampus, and basal ganglia among others

Some cortical structures, e.g., the cingulate cortex, insular cortex, and orbitofrontal cortex, are sometimes also seen as part of the limbic system

Question 4

diminished emotional responses are associated with what?

Answer 4

injuries in the amygdala

Question 5

key role of amygdala in what?

Answer 5

fear conditioning

Question 6

amygdala role in fear circuit

Answer 6

amygdala:
– detects the threat on an unconscious level
– regulates behavioral and physiological responses, and
– sends signals to the cognitive systems which in turn give rise to the conscious feeling of fear

Question 7

LeDoux 1996 two pathways that lead to the amygdala

Answer 7

a ‘quick and dirty’ low road: doesn’t involve cortical processing and activates the amygdala in a 12ms time-frame (sensory thalamus –> amygdala)

a ‘slow but accurate’ high road: (sensory thalamus –> sensory cortex –> amygdala)

(both start of with emotional stimulus and end with an emotional response)

Question 8

LeDoux 1996 dual process enables what?

Answer 8

enables us to react before we (consciously) fear

Question 9

what does the amygdala stimulate in response to a detected threat?

Answer 9

HPA axis

Question 10

how does amygdala stimulate the HPA axis?

Answer 10

through indirect projections to the hypothalamus

Question 11

HPA axis

Answer 11

• amygdala stimulates the HPA axis through indirect projections to the hypothalamus
• results in a release of corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF), which stimulates the anterior pituitary to release adrenocortico-trophic hormone (ACTH) into the bloodstream
• this stimulates the secretion of cortisol in the adrenal gland, causing blood levels of cortisol to rise

Question 12

LeDoux 2012 reconceptualisation renaming survival circuits - what did this propose?

Answer 12

recognises the amygdala’s importance in triggering physiological responses to threat, but asserts that it is less important to subjective feelings

An evidence is that direct electrical stimulation of the amygdala reliably elicits physiological responses, but subjects do not report feelings (Inman et al., 2020)

Moreover, patients with amygdala lesions can consciously report emotional experiences, including fear (Anderson & Phelps, 2002)

Question 13

anxiety disorders are associated with what?

Answer 13

amygdala hyperactivity to threatening and neutral stimuli (Janak and Tye 2015)

This applies to panic disorder, social phobias, and, to a lesser extent, PTSD and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)

Question 14

what does increased amygdala activity lead to?

Answer 14

hypothalamo-pituitary axis activation and a subsequent increase in hormone levels

Question 15

what does increased amygdala activity on anxious people require?

Answer 15

requires greater prefrontal cortex (PFC) activity to suppress unpleasant emotions

Question 16

amygdala hyperactivity and reduced PFC activity iw observed in what?

Answer 16

depressive disorders

Question 17

brain’s reward system consists of what 3 major components?

Answer 17

liking
wanting
learning

Question 18

what is the mesocorticaolimbic dopaminergic system composed of?

Answer 18

the ventral tegmental area (VTA), nucleus accumbens (NAc) and orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) among other brain structures

Question 19

the mesocorticaolimbic dopaminergic system is considered what?

Answer 19

the most important reward circuit (wanting) in the brain (Berridge and Kringelbach, 2015)

Question 20

role of amygdala in reward circuits is demonstrated by what findings?

Answer 20

that amygdala lesions impair also reward-based behavior (Janak & Tye, 2015), particularly in the ability to respond to cues in the face of changing reward value

Question 21

evidence has shown that the amygdala encodes what?

Answer 21

stimulus valence and also salience (Sangha et al., 2013)

Question 22

what does it mean that the amygdala encodes stimulus valence in addition to salience?

Answer 22

– some neurons respond only to a fear cue while other neurons respond only to a reward cue
– some other neurons respond to both fear and reward cue, and proportionately to ANS activation

Question 23

what is the orbitofrontal cortex connected reciprocally with and what does this form?

Answer 23

the amygdala to form a tightly linked circuit (Adolphs 2002)

Question 24

processing capacity of OFC

Answer 24

polymodal processing capacity receiving multi-modality inputs both directly from neocortical sensory areas and indirectly via the amygdala

Question 25

what is the OFC thought to act as?

Answer 25

an integrator of the inner and outer worlds

Question 26

what is the OFC thought to be responsible for?

Answer 26

gut reactions to people and events

Question 27

what have recent studies found the OFC represents?

Answer 27

reward value (Rolls et al., 2020)

Question 28

what do OFC lesions impair?

Answer 28

decision making in situation of cessation of previously available reward

Question 29

what are the prefrontal subdivisions of the brain?

Answer 29

dorsolateral, rostral and ventrolateral (seen side on from outside)

orbitofrontal in the top of the front (seen by looking down onto the brain)

ventromedial and dorsomedial (side on on cross section of the brain)

Question 30

Pessoa 2014 view on brain network perspective of emotion

Answer 30

brain regions participate in many functions (pluripotency), and many functions are carried out by many regions (degeneracy)

Question 31

pluripotency

Answer 31

brain regions participate in many functions

Question 32

degeneracy

Answer 32

many functions are carried out by many regions

Question 33

how are brain processes carried out according to Goldman-Rakic 1988?

Answer 33

distributed and parallel rather than sequential and hierarchical

Question 34

features of brain networks

Answer 34

contain overlapping brain regions so specific areas belong to several intersecting networks - so the processes carried out by a given brain region is not fixed to a certain mental function

Question 35

what did McIntosh (2000) propose a region’s network affiliation is dynamically determined by?

Answer 35

the interactions between different parts of the brain at a given time, i.e., the neural context

Question 36

example to support Macintosh 2000 view that network affiliation is determined by interactions between parts of the brain at a given time

Answer 36

when a cue signals the possibility of reward (compared to non-reward cue), cortical-subcortical functional connections increased systematically (Kinnison et al., 2012)

Question 37

emotional processing increases what at the overall network level?

Answer 37

functional connections across cortical and subcortical regions

Question 38

within the cortex, functional connectivity increased in the case of what?

Answer 38

in the case of reward (Pessoa & McMenamin, 2017)

Question 39

within the cortex, functional connectivity decreased where in the case of what?

Answer 39

ecreased within several cortical regions in the case of threat (Pessoa & McMenamin, 2017)

Question 40

stronger signal correlations in the salience network are associated with what?

Answer 40

stronger negative affect (Hermans et al., 2011)

Question 41

3 intensively studies networks

Answer 41

salience network
executive control network
default (or task-negative) network

Question 42

salience network

Answer 42

thought to be important for orienting attention to conspicuous stimuli (e.g., potential threats), and in the taking of rapid, unpremeditated actions

Question 43

executive control network

Answer 43

thought to be important for the control of executive functions involving goal-oriented processing, deliberate attention, and working memory

Question 44

default (or task-negative) network

Answer 44

observed in the absence of effortful tasks, typically during resting state scans; is associated with episodic memory retrieval, autobiographical memory, and semantic memory related to internal thought etc.

Question 45

experiment studying changes in network organisation across time and its findings

Answer 45

neuroimaging study (McMenamin et al., 2014):
- participants anticipated either threat (mild electric shocks) or safety (no shocks) for about 60 seconds
- Initially, threat increased communication within the salience network, and decreased the extent to which the executive control network facilitated communication between other networks
- However, during the intermediate period, threat decreased efficiency in the salience network, and the amygdala became more engaged in communicating between networks

Question 46

evidence of cultural effects on emotion

Answer 46

 In a cross-cultural study (Boiger, 2013), participants indicated for a range of anger and shame situations, their appraisals and action tendencies as well as anger and shame intensity

 A bottom-up (i.e. data-driven) classification program was used to identify types of anger

 The dominant Japanese type of anger (55% of Japanese respondents) was characterized by nodding and smiling, as well as rumination – which hurts relationships least

 A major American type of anger (43% of Americans) was strongly associated with blaming the other person and direct expression

 In a series of studies, emotions in Japanese contexts appear to be understood as between people, whereas in American contexts emotions are understood as primarily within people (Uchida et al., 2009)

 Analysis of television interviews of Olympic athletes revealed that when asked about their relationships, Japanese athletes used significantly more emotion words than American athletes

 Moreover, Japanese observers inferred more emotions when viewing athletes pictured with teammates, while American observers inferred more emotion for athletes pictured alone

 Chentsova-Dutton and Tsai (2010) primed participants either the individual self or a family member, and then measured their emotions in response to a film or a piece of music

 European Americans rated their emotions as more intense after individual-self prime, while Asian Americans rated their emotions as more intense after family prime

 The findings suggest that for European Americans emotion is individually-oriented and linked to independent conception of self, whereas for Asian Americans emotion is relationship-oriented and linked to interdependent conception of self

Question 47

differences in neurobiological substrates (study)

Answer 47

 An fMRI study with Chinese, Asian American, and European American participants recorded different correlates of emotion during emotional film clips (Immordino-Yang et al., 2014):

 In Chinese, feeling strength was associated more with activation of the ventral than the dorsal anterior insula;

 in European Americans, feeling strength was associated more with activation of the dorsal than the ventral anterior insula;

 the bicultural East-Asian American group showed an inter-mediate pattern of activation, with brain activity equally divided between the ventral and the dorsal anterior insula.

Question 48

most emotions occur in the contexts of what?

Answer 48

social interactions and relationshihps

Question 49

example of a non-social emotion

Answer 49

those caused by physical threats

Question 50

according to Boiger & Mesquita, 2012, how are emotions constructed?

Answer 50

socially

Question 51

according to Boiger & Mesquita, 2012, the unfolding of emotions is a function of what?

Answer 51

– moment-to-moment social interactions
– ongoing relationships (relationship quality & future expectancy) – sociocultural contexts

Question 52

De Leersnyder et al., 2021 culture; logic to emotion

Answer 52

 Emotions reflect and negotiate people’s self-definition as well as
social relationships (i.e., emotions is relationship engagements)

 Different ways of being and relating are valued in different cultural context, so the emotions that are valued also differ

 Hence, emotions that are helpful in achieving the culturally valued self and relationship goals are encouraged and rewarded. As a result, people experience these emotions more frequently and more intensely