Lesson about emotion, stress, and health, Lecture notes of Psychology

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Biopsychology ofBiopsychology of

Emotion, Stress, and Emotion, Stress, and

Health Health

Point of Emotions?



Primitive way of communicating states

(before language) and cross-species

communication



Threats, coaching, crossing language

barriers, approvals, STOP!

Embodied Emotions

 Emotions can influence the state of the body  Emotions can also be influenced by the state of the body  How we feel somatically influences how we feel in the brain AND vice versa.

Medial Prefrontal Lobes and

Human Emotion

 Medial portions of the orbitofrontal cortex and cingulate cortex  Site of emotion-cognitive interaction, especially cognitive suppression of emotional reactions  Possible roles in comparison of outcome and expectancy, guiding behavior based on recent experience, response to social rejection

Emotion and the Limbic System

Emotional expression is controlled by the amygdala, mammillary body, hippocampus, fornix, cortex of the cingulate gyrus, septum pellucidum, olfactory bulb, and the hypothalamus.

Brain Mechanisms of Human

Emotion: Cognitive Neuroscience

 (^) Three main points have advanced the understanding of brain mechanisms of emotion  (^) Brain activity associated with each human emotion is diffuse (No clear cortical representation)  (^) There is usually motor and sensory regional activity along with an emotional response (Some form of expression)  (^) Brain activity for experienced, imagined, or observed emotion is similar

Emotions and Facial Expression

 Facial expressions are universal  Facial feedback hypothesis – smiling makes you happier; facial muscles influence emotional experience  Microexpressions – brief facial expressions reveal true feelings; may break through false ones  Different muscles involved in fake and real smiles

Six Primary Emotions

Emotions and Facial Expression

 Paul Ekman  Facial Action Coding System (FACS) is a system to taxonomize human facial movements by their appearance on the face, Refined by Paul Ekman and Wallace V. Friesen, and published in 1978.

Fear, Defense, and Aggression

 Fear – emotional reaction to threat  Aggressive behaviors – designed to threaten or harm  (^) Defensive behaviors – designed to protect from threat or harm (motivated by fear)  (^) Social aggression – unprovoked attacks on members of one’s own species to establish dominance  Defensive attack – aggressive behavior, as when cornered

Basic Fear Circuit

Amygdala and Fear Conditioning

 Amygdala is in charge of learning fear  The amygdala receives input from all sensory systems  Appears to be responsible for adding emotional significance to another stimulus  Amygdala projects to brainstem regions that control emotional behavior output

Neural Mechanisms of Fear

Conditioning

 Fear conditioning  Pair a neutral stimulus (e.g., a tone) with an aversive stimulus (e.g., a shock)  Present the tone later and the animal will show a conditioned fear response  (^) Usually a defensive behavior

Contextual Fear Conditioning

and the Hippocampus



Pair an aversive stimulus with the context

instead of with a discrete stimulus

 Hippocampus is linked to spatial memory  Effect of bilateral hippocampal lesions on contextual fear conditioning  Before training – prevents conditioning  Shortly after training – blocks retention of conditioning

Amygdala Complex and Fear

Conditioning

 Lateral amygdala is most critical in conditioned fear  In addition, conditioned fear is suppressed by the prefrontal cortex inhibiting the lateral amygdala (feedback loop)  The hippocampus mediates conditioned fear learning by informing the lateral amygdala about the context of the fear-related event

Aggression and Testosterone

 Social aggression in humans  Varying levels of testosterone has no affect on aggression levels. (roid rage and aggressive outburst are not really conclusive)  (^) Violent criminals and aggressive male athletes may have high testosterone levels, but may be a result (not cause) of aggressive behavior (MAOA gene is more plausible)

Problems with studying the

aggression circuit

 It is intertwined with other areas of the brain that govern other social behaviors.  (^) Measured blood testosterone level; should measure brain- part testosterone level.  (^) Failure of researchers to distinguish between social aggression (testosterone-related, for establishing dominance) and defensive aggression (e.g., when cornered)

Emotional Hijacking

 When our amygdala bypasses our normal higher cortical processes  “Nan-laban”, “nan-dilim ang paningin”, “I said ‘I love you’ but I lied! Hehehe

Stress and Health  Hans Selye  Stress – reaction to harm or threat  Stressors – stimuli that cause stress  Chronic psychological stress – most clearly linked to ill health  In the short-term, stress is adaptive; in the long- term, it is maladaptive