Response and Habituation of the Human Amygdala during Visual Processing of Facial Expression

Breiter, Hans C.; Etcoff, Nancy L.; Whalen, Paul J.; Kennedy, William A.; Rauch, Scott L.; Buckner, Randy L.; Strauss, Monica; Hyman, Steven E.; Rosen, Bruce R.

doi:10.1016/s0896-6273(00)80219-6

Cited by 1,577 publications

(1,099 citation statements)

References 55 publications

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“…Within corrugator, early responses to angry expressions decreased over repeated trials, reflecting habituation which is typical of reflexive responses. There may be a relationship with the fast habituation of amygdalar responses to emotional facial expressions (Breiter et al, 1996;Whalen et al, 1998), in particular because the amygdala are involved in relatively fast, automatic facial mimicry reactions (Wild et al, 2003). Interestingly, as seen in Fig.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 95%

Facial EMG responses to dynamic emotional facial expressions in boys with disruptive behavior disorders

Wied

Boxtel

Zaalberg

et al. 2006

Journal of Psychiatric Research

110

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Based on the assumption that facial mimicry is a key factor in emotional empathy, and clinical observations that children with disruptive behavior disorders (DBD) are weak empathizers, the present study explored whether DBD boys are less facially responsive to facial expressions of emotions than normal controls. Facial electromyographic (EMG) activity in the zygomaticus major and corrugator supercilii muscle regions, and heart rate activity were studied in 22 clinically referred 8-12-year-old DBD boys and 22 age-matched normal controls during exposure to dynamic happy and angry expressions. Dispositional emotional empathy was assessed by a self-report questionnaire for children. The happy and angry facial expressions evoked distinct facial EMG response patterns, with increased zygomaticus muscle activity to happy expressions and increased corrugator muscle activity to angry expressions. The corrugator (but not the zygomaticus) muscle response pattern was less pronounced for DBD boys than the normal controls. Attending to the emotional expressions was associated with equivalent cardiac deceleration in both groups, reflecting a similar orienting/attention response. Lower empathy scores were obtained for DBD boys than for normal controls. In conclusion, facial mimicry responses to angry facial expressions were subnormal in DBD boys, which may be a sign of a deficient early component in the process of emotional empathy, and thus play a role in impaired empathic responding.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 95%

Facial EMG responses to dynamic emotional facial expressions in boys with disruptive behavior disorders

Wied

Boxtel

Zaalberg

et al. 2006

Journal of Psychiatric Research

110

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…There are also data suggesting that they may also be mutually excitatory, or at least that the amygdala may excite rACC (Budhani et al, 2007;Nakic et al, 2006;Pezawas et al, 2005). Specifically, rACC is found active in affective stimuli processing (Breiter et al 1996;Dolan et al 1996;Elliott et al 2000;George et al 1993). It is therefore possible that some of the results that were suggested to indicate control over the amygdala's response actually represented excitatory activation from the amygdala.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Common regions of dorsal anterior cingulate and prefrontal–parietal cortices provide attentional control of distracters varying in emotionality and visibility

et al. 2007

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Top-down attentional control is necessary to ensure successful task performance in the presence of distracters. Lateral prefrontal cortex, parietal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex have been previously implicated in top-down attentional control. However, it is unclear whether these regions are engaged independent of distracter type or whether, as has been suggested for anterior cingulate cortex, different regions provide attentional control over emotional versus other forms of salient distracter. In the current task, subjects viewed targets that were preceded by distracters that varied in both emotionality and visibility. We found that behaviorally, the presence of preceding distracters significantly interfered with target judgment. At the neural level, increases in the emotional and visual saliency of distracters were both associated with increased activity in proximal regions of prefrontal, parietal and cingulate cortex. Moreover, a conjunction analysis indicated considerable overlap in the regions of prefrontal, parietal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex responding to distracters of increased emotionality and visibility.

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“…Supporting a role for amygdala in face processing and social judgment, early neuroimaging studies found amygdala activation in response to facial expressions of emotion, particularly fear, even when subjects were not instructed to judge emotion [6,198]. Indeed, amygdala is activated by subliminal presentations of facial expression stimuli [199].…”

Section: The Neural Substrates For Recognition Of Emotion Expressionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Autism and the development of face processing

Golarai

Grill-Spector

Reiss

2006

Clinical Neuroscience Research

158

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Autism is a pervasive developmental condition, characterized by impairments in non-verbal communication, social relationships and stereotypical patterns of behavior. A large body of evidence suggests that several aspects of face processing are impaired in autism, including anomalies in gaze processing, memory for facial identity and recognition of facial expressions of emotion. In search of neural markers of anomalous face processing in autism, much interest has focused on a network of brain regions that are implicated in social cognition and face processing. In this review, we will focus on three such regions, namely the STS for its role in processing gaze and facial movements, the FFA in face detection and identification and the amygdala in processing facial expressions of emotion. Much evidence suggests that a better understanding of the normal development of these specialized regions is essential for discovering the neural bases of face processing anomalies in autism. Thus, we will also examine the available literature on the normal development of face processing. Key unknowns in this research area are the neuro-developmental processes, the role of experience and the interactions among components of the face processing system in shaping each of the specialized regions for processing faces during normal development and in autism. Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of Association for Research in Nervous and Mental Disease.

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Response and Habituation of the Human Amygdala during Visual Processing of Facial Expression

Cited by 1,577 publications

References 55 publications

Facial EMG responses to dynamic emotional facial expressions in boys with disruptive behavior disorders

Facial EMG responses to dynamic emotional facial expressions in boys with disruptive behavior disorders

Common regions of dorsal anterior cingulate and prefrontal–parietal cortices provide attentional control of distracters varying in emotionality and visibility

Autism and the development of face processing

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