Emotions Dr. Piasecki Flashcards
Where do we find emotions?
in the amygdala
What is a major structure leading to patterns of physiological change which pause when emotions occur?
amygdala
How come we can have an emotion reaction/response before we’re aware of what’s going on?
becuas their is a connection to the thalamus to cortex to amydala
The innermost part of the brain is about (blank)
survival
What do emotions do for us?
help us respond to important situations and to convey our intentions to others
The voluntary smile is driven by?
motor cortex, pyramidal tracts
What is the involuntary smile driven by?
motor areas in ant cingulte, extrapyramidal, reticular activating system
What is your emotional response driven by?
subjective
autonomic
What parts of your brain contribute to your emotional response?
structures
pathways
what is the emotional motor system?
subective experience-> visceral and somatic motor response
What is a primary emotion experienced by all social animals that creates a visceral motor and somatic motor response?
fear
How do you measure fear in animals?
heart rate and blood pressure salivation respiratory rate scanning startle urination/defecation freezing
What is the brains shortcut for emotions?
it can directly hit up the amygdala from the thalamus and bypass the visual cortex
how do humans respond to fear?
heart pounding or racing dry mouth pale skin respiratory rate hypervigilance increased startle urination/diarrhea apprehensive expectation
What are the brain structures that mediate emotion?
hypothalamus limbic system (limbic cortex, amygdala) brainstem nucleus accumbens prefrontal cortex
What does the hypothalamus function in?
light dark cycle
temperature regulation
neuroendocrine
integral in emotion and sexual behaviors
What do the removal of the cerebral hemispheres show?
showed that the hypothalamus integrated emotions and behaviors
What kind of emotion is experienced with ablation of just the cerebral hemispheres? Of the cerebral hemispheres AND the hypothalamus?
rage, attack with just the hemispheres
Docility with the hemispheres and hypothalamus
What is the the route information takes to go through the hypothalamus?
input form cortex (relatively unprocessed)
output to brainstem’s reticular formation
What is the link between higher cortical activity and the “lower” systems that control emotional behavior?
limbic system
What makes up the limbic system?
the limbic lobe and deep lying structures (amygdala, hippocampus, mamillary bodies)
What are considered the deep lying structures of the limbic system?
amygdala, hippocampus, mamillary bodies
What allows you to have the duchenne smile?
cingulate gyrus
What is this:
primitive cortical tissue with a cingulate gyrus and parahippocampal gyrus
limbic lobe
Where is the limbic lobe located?
encircles the upper brain stem (around corpus callosum)
what does the limbic system do?
integrates info about emotional content from cortical association areas
What happens if you remove an aggressive monkeys amygdala?
they become docile, horny and compulsive
What is kluver bucy syndrome?
it is severe temporal lobe damage, specifically to the AMYGDALA that results in visual agnosia, apathy/placidity, disturbance in sexual function, dementia, aphasia, amnesia
What are these a part of
orbital and medial prefrontal cortex (PFC)
nucleus of thalamus
amygdala
limbic structure
What is the amygdala?
a nuclear mass
Where is the amygdala?
buried in the white matter of the temporal lobe, in front of the hippocampus
What does the amygdala do?
connects to olfactory bulb
cerebral cortex (frontal and association areas of temporal lobe)
brainstem and hypothalamus
What is considered the “emotional association area”?
amygdala
What links the cortical areas the process sensory info to hypothalamus and brainstem effector systems?
amygdala
What allows for emotional learning?
amygdala (associative learning)
How can you abolish fear response?
remove on amygdala and block visual information from the eye on that side
What kind of conditioning is this:
pair tone and foot shock, then tone alone ellicits fear and increased BP and freezing.
associative learning fear response
What happens if you infuse NMDA antagonist (preventing LTP) into amygdala during learning?
prevents facilitated learning and long term potentiation
What happens to fear response if connection between medial geniculate and amygdala are severed prior to learning?
you dont get it
What can damage to the amygdala case?
messed up adaptive responses
asymmetric responses
non adaptive responses
What are the non-adaptive responses?
overactive learned fear response:
PTSD, Depression, Phobias
Why does the amydala give you pleasure?
gives emotional coloring of environment
learned rewards (anticipation of pleasure)
place for drug abuse
gives you emotional significance of environment (adapt, size, reproduce)
natural rewards elevate (blank)
dopamine
What is the neurological basis for pleasure? How does this relate to addiction?
nucleus accumbens
raises your dopamine levels hugely
What gives the highest release of dopamine?
amphetamines
What gives you the longest release of dopamine?
cocaine
What gives you varying amounts of dopamine release with different amounts of consumption, but begins to lessen the amount of release after a certain amount of conusmption.
ethanol
What happens after you stop taking cocaine
your dopamine levels fall below normal :(
What do drugs do to your brain?
it rewires them
(blank) may experience a powerful urger to use when they encounter environmental cues associated with use. (blank) regions of the brain are activated when watching cocaine-related videos.
cocaine abusers
limbic
Where do psychopaths have changes in their brain?
in the amygdala
How does the orbitofrontal cortex regulate emotion?
the posterior frontal lobe mediates aggression and emotional responsiveness
What happens if you have damage to the posterior frontal lobe?
disinhibition
Lesion input from amygdala results in what?
decreased rage from disappointed primates
What are 2 amydala abnormalities?
kluver-bucy
urbach-wiethe
What are these: frontal lobe injuries temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) amydala abnormalities lobotomy stroke
Structural brain disorders
What are the symptoms of kluver bucy syndrome?
agnosia, apathy
disturbed sexual behavior
dementia, aphasia, amnesia
What are causes of Kluver Budy Syndrome?
tumors, trauma, herpes, surgery
What is this:
a rare genetic disease
bilateral calcification and atrophy of anterior temporal lobes
unable to identify fear from photos
Urbach-Wiethe
What do you call it when you separate the tracts from orbitofrontal cortex to amygdala?
lobotomy
Is there lateralization of emotions?
yes
What does the right hemisphere do?
expession and comprehension of emotional (affective) content
Which ear/hemifield is better at detecting emotional nuances of speech/ images
and which side of the face may be more expressive of emotion
the left side
What side of the brain does this:
The understanding and expression of affective (mood) components to speech
Relatively more L facial emotional expression
R hemisphere
What happens if you damage the right hemisphere?
aprosody
unable to read emotional coloring of speech
all speech becomes email like
What side of the brain is affected if you get aphasia?
left hemisphere
What is this:
poor comprehension of words
still understand emotional content
clinical situations
aphasia
What are the hemispheric contributions to mood?
Left-> positive emotions
Right-> negative emotions
So if you damage the left anterior side of your brain what will your mood be like?
If you damage the right anterior side of your brain what will your mood be like?
depressed
elevated mood
Depression more than (blank) the likelihood of dying in the 10 years after a stroke/
triples (treatment with antidepressants may improve survival)
Nevada rate for elderly suicide is (blank) percent of national average
300%
Is there a genetic component in depression?
yes
What is the number 2 disabling diseases of westernized countries?
severe depressed mood and impaired functioning
What is the definition of depression?
5 or more symptoms of 2+ weeks
(depressed mood, decreased energy, sleep and appetite changes, memory/concentration changes, thought of death/suicide, guilt, decreased interests, tearfulness)
What is the cause of depression?
neurotransmitter
structural
functional
What happens to your blood flow in depression?
in increases to the amygdala (correlates with severity of depression)
What moderates negative emotional output fo amygdala?
left prefrontal cortex
If your left prefrontal cortex fails what can you get?
depression
What happens if you have a left prefrontal cortex?
“Peppy” L PFC: extraversion
Levels of cortisol are lower
Less reactive to stressors
Individual differences measured in infants, adults
What happens if you have a low level of L PFC function?
You will be sad
What am I talking about:
Smaller volume of ventral anterior cingulate in depressed patients (40% smaller) on PET scans with less blood flow
Blood flow normalizes with treatment of depression
Smaller volume may be related to loss of glial cells
cell loss from toxic cortisol levels secondary to stress
characteristics of the left prefrontal cortex in depressed pt’s
Animals experiencing repeat stress can result in shrinking of (blank)
hippocampus
(blank) may shrink in people with recurrent depression
hippocampus
hippocampal cell loss may lead to (blank) decline
cognitive
Since you can get hippocampul degeneration which will result in depression, how can you get get this dysregulation?
following significant childhood adversity or long term excess cortisol exposure
Stress decreased (blank) in hippocampus (could contribute to atrophy and decreased functioning of neurons)
BDNF
emotional responses mediated by (blank) and (Blank)
hypothalamus and limbic structures
(blank) may lead to disturbed behaviors and emotions
injuries
Depression and addiction are (blank) diseases
brain
Environment interacts with (blank)
genome
What all makes up the limbic system?
hippocampus, amygdala, and nucleus accumbens
T/F: more empathic doctors are more effective, allowing patients to heal faster, become more adherent, and increase the effectiveness of substance abuse therapy
T
T/F: Student levels of empathy have been proven to fall as they pass through medical school
T
