Buchanan Tony W, Bibas David, Adolphs Ralph
Department of Psychology; Saint Louis University; Saint Louis, MO USA.
Commun Integr Biol. 2010 Nov;3(6):525-7. doi: 10.4161/cib.3.6.12606. Epub 2010 Nov 1.
We recently reported data related to emotions collected in conjunction with a museum exhibit on emotion (Goose Bumps!-The Science of Fear).1 In this addendum, we present additional data collected as part of that study. We collected two commonly measured indices of emotional arousal, salivary cortisol and α-amylase, before and after participants had gone through a realistic fear challenge course as part of the exhibit. We found that α-amylase, but not cortisol, showed a highly specific increase only for those participants who endorsed both emotional arousal and negative valence. By contrast, the fear-inducing course resulted in high arousal but positive valence in some participants; in these, no increased α-amylase was measured. We conclude that salivary α-amylase is a promising biomarker for fearful experiences, and suggest that it is important to pay attention to positively valenced arousal that may be induced by fearful stimuli in a laboratory setting.
我们最近报告了与一个关于情感的博物馆展览（《鸡皮疙瘩！——恐惧的科学》）相关的情感数据。在本附录中，我们展示了作为该研究一部分收集的更多数据。在参与者作为展览的一部分体验了一个逼真的恐惧挑战课程前后，我们收集了两个常用的情绪唤醒指标，即唾液皮质醇和α-淀粉酶。我们发现，只有那些认可情绪唤醒和负性效价的参与者，α-淀粉酶而非皮质醇出现了高度特异性的升高。相比之下，恐惧诱导课程在一些参与者中导致了高唤醒但正性效价；在这些参与者中，未检测到α-淀粉酶升高。我们得出结论，唾液α-淀粉酶是恐惧体验的一个有前景的生物标志物，并建议关注实验室环境中恐惧刺激可能诱导的正性效价唤醒很重要。
