Anders Silke, Eippert Falk, Weiskopf Nikolaus, Veit Ralf
Institute of Medical Psychology and Behavioral Neurobiology, University of Tübingen, Germany.
Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2008 Sep;3(3):233-43. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsn017. Epub 2008 Aug 12.
With the advent of studies showing that amygdala responses are not limited to fear-related or highly unpleasant stimuli, studies began to focus on stimulus valence and stimulus-related arousal as predictors of amygdala activity. Recent studies in the chemosensory domain found amygdala activity to increase with the intensity of negative and positive chemosensory stimuli. This has led to the proposal that amygdala activity might be an indicator of emotional arousal, at least in the chemosensory domain. The present study investigated amygdala activity in response to visual and auditory stimuli. By selecting stimuli based on individual valence and arousal ratings, we were able to dissociate stimulus valence and stimulus-related arousal, both on the verbal and the peripheral physiological level. We found that the amygdala was sensitive to stimulus valence even when arousal was controlled for, and that increased amygdala activity was better explained by valence than by arousal. The proposed difference in the relation between amygdala activity and stimulus-related arousal between the chemosensory and the audiovisual domain is discussed in terms of the amygdala's embedding within these sensory systems and the processes by which emotional meaning is derived.
随着研究表明杏仁核反应不仅限于与恐惧相关或高度不愉快的刺激，研究开始聚焦于刺激效价和与刺激相关的唤醒作为杏仁核活动的预测指标。近期在化学感觉领域的研究发现，杏仁核活动会随着负面和正面化学感觉刺激的强度增加而增强。这导致了一种观点，即杏仁核活动可能是情绪唤醒的一个指标，至少在化学感觉领域是这样。本研究调查了杏仁核对视觉和听觉刺激的反应。通过根据个体效价和唤醒评分选择刺激，我们能够在言语和外周生理水平上区分刺激效价和与刺激相关的唤醒。我们发现，即使在控制了唤醒的情况下，杏仁核对刺激效价仍很敏感，并且杏仁核活动的增加用效价来解释比用唤醒更好。根据杏仁核在这些感觉系统中的嵌入情况以及衍生出情绪意义的过程，讨论了化学感觉领域和视听领域中杏仁核活动与与刺激相关的唤醒之间关系的拟议差异。
