Morningstar M, Billetdeaux K A, Mattson W I, Gilbert A C, Nelson E E, Hoskinson K R
Department of Psychology, Queen's University, 62 Arch Street, Kingston, ON, K7L 3L3, Canada.
Centre for Neuroscience Studies, Queen's University, Kingston, Canada.
Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci. 2025 Apr;25(2):454-470. doi: 10.3758/s13415-024-01224-6. Epub 2024 Sep 20.
Previous research has identified regions of the brain that are sensitive to emotional intensity in faces, with some evidence for developmental differences in this pattern of response. However, comparable understanding of how the brain tracks linear variations in emotional prosody is limited-especially in youth samples. The current study used novel stimuli (morphing emotional prosody from neutral to anger/happiness in linear increments) to investigate whether neural response to vocal emotion was parametrically modulated by emotional intensity and whether there were age-related changes in this effect. Participants aged 8-21 years (n = 56, 52% female) completed a vocal emotion recognition task, in which they identified the intended emotion in morphed recordings of vocal prosody, while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging. Parametric analyses of whole-brain response to morphed stimuli found that activation in the bilateral superior temporal gyrus (STG) scaled to emotional intensity in angry (but not happy) voices. Multivariate region-of-interest analyses revealed the same pattern in the right amygdala. Sensitivity to emotional intensity did not vary by participants' age. These findings provide evidence for the linear parameterization of emotional intensity in angry vocal prosody within the bilateral STG and right amygdala. Although findings should be replicated, the current results also suggest that this pattern of neural sensitivity may not be subject to strong developmental influences.
先前的研究已经确定了大脑中对面部情绪强度敏感的区域，有证据表明这种反应模式存在发育差异。然而，对于大脑如何追踪情绪韵律的线性变化，尤其是在青少年样本中的情况，目前的理解还很有限。本研究使用了新颖的刺激（将情绪韵律从中性以线性增量转变为愤怒/快乐）来调查对声音情绪的神经反应是否会受到情绪强度的参数调制，以及这种效应是否存在与年龄相关的变化。8至21岁的参与者（n = 56，52%为女性）完成了一项声音情绪识别任务，在进行功能磁共振成像时，他们要在声音韵律的变形录音中识别出预期的情绪。对变形刺激的全脑反应进行参数分析发现，双侧颞上回（STG）的激活与愤怒（而非快乐）声音中的情绪强度成比例。多变量感兴趣区域分析在右侧杏仁核中也发现了相同的模式。对情绪强度的敏感性并不因参与者的年龄而有所不同。这些发现为双侧STG和右侧杏仁核内愤怒声音韵律中情绪强度的线性参数化提供了证据。尽管这些发现需要重复验证，但目前的结果也表明这种神经敏感性模式可能不受强烈的发育影响。
