W11.1(C): Fear and the amygdala Flashcards
(13 cards)
What is dopaminergic signalling in the striatum believed to account for?
Individual differences in traits e.g. impulsivity, that are risk factors for ADHD
What are complex emotions?
Combinations of basic emotions that may be socially or culturally learned, require cognitive processing e.g. regret, grief
What are basic emotions?
Unique characteristics that are developed through evolution, reflected in facial expressions, relatively automatically generated e.g. fear, sadness, gisgust
What is the shape of the amygdala and where is it located?
Two small almond shaped structures in the medial temporal lobe on the end of the hippocampus
How do rats behave in response to a robotic rat pre and post amygdala lesion? (LeDoux, 1996)
Pre amygdala lesion- runs away almost instantly when confronted with robot rat moving
Post amygdala lesion- takes much longer to react to the rat if it all
Shows the amygdala lesion blocks fear learning
Where does much of what we know about the amygdala come from?
The fear conditioning paradigm (unconditioned stimulus producing unconditioned response when tone is added with shock, learn associate tone with shock so when the shock is played alone it startles the rat)
What is extinction and how can it be carried out?
Getting rid of the association- at first the rat is startled but over time as the tone is played without the shock, the rat unlearns the association
How do the tone evoked firing rate of cells change when exposed to a conditioned tone and then during extinction?
Tone evoked firing rate of lateral amygdala cells increases during firing but plasticity goes away after extinction
Describe the differences in the low and high road (LeDoux)
Low road: very fast, unconscious, fight or flight, 15ms
High road- 300ms, conscious experience, much higher level of detail and full sensory analysis of threat, sensory properties of stimulus are analysed in visual cortex before travelling to amygdala
How did Feinstein et al (2013) investigate bilateral amygdala damage using CO2 inhalation?
Gave patients with amygdala damage co2 inhalation (not harmful but panic is a false biological alarm- protective system) and found that they had an ELEVATED panic response (all patients w lesions had panic attacks and only 25% controls did)
What did Feinstein et al’s (2013) results on bilateral amygdala damage using CO2 inhalation show?
Intact fear response to co2 inhalation in patients with damage to both amygdalas suggest they can experience fear, and suggests that the amygdala is not necessary for the conscious experience of fear but perhaps plays a role in the translation of external threats into a fearful response
How did Bechara et al (1995) study conscious and unconscious learning in the amygdala?
Studied 3 patients- one with amygdala lesion, one with hippocampal lesion and one with damage to both structures
Conditioned stimulus was the coloured slide/tone, unconditioned stimulus was boat horn, measured skin conductance response and asked ppts to report explicit knowledge of which CS predicted the US
What did Bechara et al (1995) find when studying conscious and unconscious learning in the amygdala?
Patient w amygdala damage showed impaired SCR to the conditioned stimulus but intact factual learning
Patient w hippocampus damage showed normal SCR to conditioned stimulus but impaired factual learning
Patients w damage to both showed impaired SCR to conditioned stimulus and impaired factual learning
