Department of Neurobiology and Behavior, Unit of Basic Medical Sciences, Course of Medical and Dental Sciences, Nagasaki University, Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, 1-12-4 Sakamoto, Nagasaki 852-8523, Japan.
Neurosci Res. 2011 Jun;70(2):183-8. doi: 10.1016/j.neures.2011.02.007. Epub 2011 Feb 23.
A considerable body of research has focused on neural responses evoked by emotional facial expressions, but little is known about mother-specific brain responses to infant facial emotions. We used near-infrared spectroscopy to investigate prefrontal activity during discriminating facial expressions of happy, angry, sad, fearful, surprised and neutral of unfamiliar infants and unfamiliar adults by 14 mothers and 14 age-matched females who have never been pregnant (non-mothers). Our results revealed that discriminating infant facial emotions increased the relative oxyHb concentration in mothers' right prefrontal cortex but not in their left prefrontal cortex, compared with each side of the prefrontal cortices of non-mothers. However, there was no difference between mothers and non-mothers in right or left prefrontal cortex activation while viewing adult facial expressions. These results suggest that the right prefrontal cortex is involved in human maternal behavior concerning infant facial emotion discrimination.
大量研究集中在情绪面部表情引起的神经反应上，但对于母亲对婴儿面部情绪的特异性大脑反应知之甚少。我们使用近红外光谱技术研究了 14 位母亲和 14 位从未怀孕的年龄匹配的女性（非母亲）在辨别陌生婴儿和陌生成年人的快乐、愤怒、悲伤、恐惧、惊讶和中性面部表情时前额叶的活动。我们的结果表明，与非母亲的前额叶左右两侧相比，母亲辨别婴儿面部表情时右侧前额叶的相对氧合血红蛋白浓度增加，但左侧前额叶没有增加。然而，母亲和非母亲在观看成人面部表情时，右侧或左侧前额叶的激活没有差异。这些结果表明，右前额叶参与了人类母亲对婴儿面部情绪识别的行为。
