Emotion - Fear Flashcards
Darwin on fear
fear takes the gradation from mere attention to extreme terror
Fear
An unpleasant emotion or thought that you have when you are frightened or worried by something dangerous, painful, or bad that is happening or might happen
Distinguishing between fear and anxiety
fear is an emotion that results from the mere presence to highly imminent or tangible threat, while anxiety is evoked when an aversive stimulus is abstract or remote in time or space
Blanchard and Blanchard suggest that there are three levels of danger:
potential threat, distal threat, proximal threat
Survival intelligence
The ability to combat ecological threats, learn and adjust to changing threats in changing environments
Intelligent survival behaviors have developed via ____ and _____ between ____ and ______ (Dawkins and Krebs, 1977)
adaptations, counter-adaptations; predator, prey
Higher survival intelligence is associated with the ability to evade threat through _____, ______, and _____.
prediction (e.g. simulation), flexible cognitive appraisals, and vicarious learning systems
Evolutionary tinkering has formed cognitive and neurobiological _____ in perception, attention, and decision-making to deal with threat or reactions to predators.
short-cuts
Why do we feel fear?
Fear is an adaptive mechanism to protect us from threats. Fear mechanisms allows to make fast responses to threat, or sometimes slow and strategic responses to threat.
Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S, affecting 40 million adults (_____ of the U.S. population), costing the U.S. more than $42 billion a year.
18%
Phylogenetically newer components of the human brain attempt to minimize _____
our encounters with predators
Humans minimize encounters with predators through ____, _____, _____, and _____.
vicarious learning, mental simulation, risk dilution (living in groups), and niche construction
Survival skills may leave us vulnerable to _____
affective disorders such as anxiety
Our class top fears:
not good GPA, loved one ill, dying prematurely, dying alone, being lonely, pain, losing friends, failure, having close friend die, romantic rejection
Threat imminence Continuum
(1) Preferred activity (at home, nice, safe)
(2) Pre Encounter (potential danger, defensive behavior)
(3) Post Encounter (predator detected, defensive behavior)
(4) Circa Strike (attacker sees you and attacks you)
Amygdala
Input/output integration
Periaqueductal Gray
Output; fight, flight, and freezing
Location of the Subgenual cingulate cortex (sgACC)
Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex
The Ventromedial prefrontal cortex
Cognitive/input
Basolateral Amygdala
Input
Central amygdala
Output
Deep brain stimulation of this area can relieve symptoms of depression
Ventromedial prefrontal cortex (subgenual cingulate cortex)
Subgenual cingulate cortex
Should I be scared or not? (Involved in the control of emotion or the value of threat)
Location of Amygdala
Temporal Lobe (intersection of two lines coming from eyes and ears- imagine two arrows)
{Connections with amygdala}
input- sensory systems, higher order systems like prefrontal cortex, output- emotional reactivity systems
Periaqueductal gray
Flight, fight, freezing
Mobbs et al 2007 used fMRI to measure brain activity as participants played a video game involving a virtual predator that could chase, capture, and inflict pain. They found that as the virtual predator grew closer, brain activity shifted from the _____ to the ______
ventromedial prefrontal cortex to the periaqueductal gray
In Mobbs et al 2007, imminence-driven peraqueductal gray activity correlated with _____ and ____
increased subjective degree of dread and decreased confidence of escape
In Mobbs et al, distal =
vmPFC
In Mobbs et al, proximal=
PAG
Prefrontal Cortex and Lateral Amygdala involved with ____(PC & LA)
anxiety
Central amygdala and periaqueductal gray involved with (CA & PAG)
PANIC (CAPAG!)
In the context of a predator, the postencounter reflects the ______, whereas the circa-strike is associated with _______.
initial detection of the potential threat; direct predatory attack
Mobbs et al 2009 found that postencounter threat elicited activity in _____, including the _____
forebrain areas; sungenual anterior cingulate cortex (sgACC), hippocampus, and amygdala
Mobbs et al 2009 found that active avoidance during circa strike threat increased activity in ____ and _____
mid-dorsal ACC (anterior cingulate cortex) and midbrain areas
Mobbs et al 2009 observed greater activity in the _______ for high probability compared with low probability of capture during circa-strike threat.
right pregenual ACC
Panic Disorder is associated with increased ___ ____ ____ in the midbrain and reduced ______ binding
gray matter density; 5HT1A
Mobbs et al 2010 found that when a tarantula was placed closer to a subject’s foot, increased experiences of fear coincided with augmented activity in fear-related networks including the _______, ______, and _____.
periacqueductal gray, amygdala, and bed nucleus of the stria terminalis
Mobbs et al 2010 found that the ____ was engaged as the tarantual grew more distant, suggesting that this region emits safety signals or expels fear
orbitofrontal cortex
Mobbs et al 2010 (tarantula study) found activity in the _____ was also associated with underprediction of the tarantula’s threat value, and in addition to the ______, with monitoring the tarantula’s threat value as indexted by its direction of movement.
amygdala; bed nucleus of the stria terminalis
In Mobbs et al 2010, expectancy errors (the tarantula scared them more than they thought it would) were associated with greater activity in the ______. Intriguingly, greater expectancy errors were also correlated with increased _____
amygdala; misperception of the size of the tarantula
Nilli et al 2010 (the snake study) found a positive correlation between courage and activity in the _____
subgenual ACC
Selfish Herd Theory
Individuals within a population attempt to reduce their predation risk by putting other conspecifics between themselves and predators (Hamilton)
Tedeschi et al found pINS activity during shock, and parametric decrease in pINS activity associated with _______
increased ratings of competence
Low intensity of threat corresponds with anxiety and activity in the ______ and _____
sgACC/vmPFC; amygdala
High intensities of threat will evoke older structures including the ____
PAG
Tracking the threat’s direction evokes activity in the _____, while expectancy errors evoke the the _____
BNST; amygdala
Expectancy errors correlated with remembering the Tarantula as being ____
larger
Perceptions of other’s competence or ability to protect us reduces our _______
anticipation of harm
