Chekroud Adam M, Everett Jim A C, Bridge Holly, Hewstone Miles
Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford Oxford, UK ; Oxford Centre for Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging of the Brain (FMRIB), John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford University Oxford, UK.
Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford Oxford, UK.
Front Hum Neurosci. 2014 Mar 27;8:179. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2014.00179. eCollection 2014.
Prejudice is an enduring and pervasive aspect of human cognition. An emergent trend in modern psychology has focused on understanding how cognition is linked to neural function, leading researchers to investigate the neural correlates of prejudice. Research in this area using racial group memberships has quickly highlighted the amygdala as a neural structure of importance. In this article, we offer a critical review of social neuroscientific studies of the amygdala in race-related prejudice. Rather than the dominant interpretation that amygdala activity reflects a racial or outgroup bias per se, we argue that the observed pattern of sensitivity in this literature is best considered in terms of potential threat. More specifically, we argue that negative culturally-learned associations between black males and potential threat better explain the observed pattern of amygdala activity. Finally, we consider future directions for the field and offer specific experiments and predictions to directly address unanswered questions.
偏见是人类认知中一个持久且普遍存在的方面。现代心理学中一个新出现的趋势聚焦于理解认知如何与神经功能相联系，这促使研究人员去探究偏见的神经关联。该领域使用种族群体成员身份进行的研究迅速凸显了杏仁核作为一个重要的神经结构。在本文中，我们对杏仁核在与种族相关的偏见方面的社会神经科学研究进行了批判性综述。我们认为，相较于杏仁核活动本身反映种族或外群体偏见这一主流解释，该文献中观察到的敏感性模式最好从潜在威胁的角度来考虑。更具体地说，我们认为黑人男性与潜在威胁之间在文化中习得的负面关联，能更好地解释所观察到的杏仁核活动模式。最后，我们考虑了该领域未来的发展方向，并提供了具体的实验和预测，以直接解决未回答的问题。
