Amygdala and hippocampal activity during acquisition and extinction of human fear conditioning

Knight, David C.; Smith, C.W.; Cheng, Dominic T.; Stein, Elliot A.; Helmstetter, Fred J.

doi:10.3758/cabn.4.3.317

Cited by 228 publications

(155 citation statements)

References 55 publications

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“…In rabbits, CeA conditioned unit activity has been reported to extinguish during extinction training in an avoidance paradigm. 100,101 In humans, imaging studies examining amygdalar activity have reported temporary activation at the beginning of extinction training; [102][103][104] persistent activation throughout extinction training; 102 and decreased activation to a previously reinforced CS undergoing extinction but increased activation to a previously nonreinforced CS undergoing acquisition (i.e., in a reversal learning paradigm 105 ).…”

Section: Neural Mechanismsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mechanisms of fear extinction

2006

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Excessive fear and anxiety are hallmarks of a variety of disabling anxiety disorders that affect millions of people throughout the world. Hence, a greater understanding of the brain mechanisms involved in the inhibition of fear and anxiety is attracting increasing interest in the research community. In the laboratory, fear inhibition most often is studied through a procedure in which a previously fear conditioned organism is exposed to a fear-eliciting cue in the absence of any aversive event. This procedure results in a decline in conditioned fear responses that is attributed to a process called fear extinction. Extensive empirical work by behavioral psychologists has revealed basic behavioral characteristics of extinction, and theoretical accounts have emphasized extinction as a form of inhibitory learning as opposed to an erasure of acquired fear. Guided by this work, neuroscientists have begun to dissect the neural mechanisms involved, including the regions in which extinction-related plasticity occurs and the cellular and molecular processes that are engaged. The present paper will cover behavioral, theoretical and neurobiological work, and will conclude with a discussion of clinical implications. Molecular Psychiatry (2007) 12, 120-150.

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Section: Neural Mechanismsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mechanisms of fear extinction

2006

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“…Initial fMRI studies of extinction learning in humans reported an increase in amygdala activation during early extinction after the shift in the CS-US contingency (LaBar et al, 1998;Gottfried and Dolan, 2004;Knight et al, 2004;Phelps et al, 2004). Amygdala activation decreased as extinction progressed and remained low during extinction retrieval.…”

Section: Extinctionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Changing Fear: The Neurocircuitry of Emotion Regulation

Hartley

Phelps

2009

Neuropsychopharmacol

430

346

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The ability to alter emotional responses as circumstances change is a critical component of normal adaptive behavior and is often impaired in psychological disorders. In this review, we discuss four emotional regulation techniques that have been investigated as means to control fear: extinction, cognitive regulation, active coping, and reconsolidation. For each technique, we review what is known about the underlying neural systems, combining findings from animal models and human neuroscience. The current evidence suggests that these different means of regulating fear depend on both overlapping and distinct components of a fear circuitry.

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“…Although animal experimentation is necessary to understand the neural underpinnings of affective learning, it is also important to validate these animal models in humans. Functional brainimaging studies demonstrated the involvement of the amygdala in fear conditioning in humans (Büchel and Dolan, 2000;Knight et al, 2004). This line of research is complemented by studies investigating patients with lesions of the amygdala.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

Fear Conditioning following Unilateral Temporal Lobectomy: Dissociation of Conditioned Startle Potentiation and Autonomic Learning

Weike¹,

Hamm²,

Schupp³

et al. 2005

J. Neurosci.

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The present study investigated fear-potentiated startle and autonomic learning in brain-lesioned patients in a classical fear-conditioning paradigm. Startle blink and skin conductance responses of 30 patients who underwent unilateral temporal lobectomy because of drugresistant epilepsy were compared with those of 32 healthy controls. As expected, temporal lobectomy patients showed a general impairment in fear conditioning relative to controls. This impairment did not differ with respect to the affected hemisphere. Moreover, while fear-conditioned startle potentiation in healthy controls was independent of contingency awareness, skin conductance discrimination was only observed for those participants who correctly recognized the stimulus contingencies. Patients who acquired a declarative memory of the contingencies also showed intact skin conductance discrimination but failed to exhibit fear-potentiated startle. The present findings support a two-levels-of-learning account of human fear conditioning and also demonstrate that the amygdala is crucially involved in fear learning.

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Amygdala and hippocampal activity during acquisition and extinction of human fear conditioning

Cited by 228 publications

References 55 publications

Mechanisms of fear extinction

Mechanisms of fear extinction

Changing Fear: The Neurocircuitry of Emotion Regulation

Fear Conditioning following Unilateral Temporal Lobectomy: Dissociation of Conditioned Startle Potentiation and Autonomic Learning

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