Abstract
The amygdala is important for determining the emotional significance of environmental stimuli. However, the degree to which appetitive and aversive stimuli are processed by the same or different neuronal circuits within the amygdala remains unclear. Here we show that neuronal activity during the expression of classically conditioned appetitive and aversive emotional responses is more similar than expected by chance, despite the different sensory modalities of the eliciting stimuli. We also found that the activity of a large number of cells (> 43%) was correlated with blood pressure, a measure of emotional arousal. Together, our results suggest that a substantial proportion of neuronal circuits within the amygdala can contribute to both appetitive and aversive emotional arousal.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 15031-15036 |
Number of pages | 6 |
Journal | Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America |
Volume | 106 |
Issue number | 35 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Sep 1 2009 |
Keywords
- Autonomic
- Electrophysiology
- Emotion
- Fear
- Pavlovian conditioning
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- General