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The amygdala is one of the best-understood brain regions with regard to differences between the sexes. The amygdala is larger in males than females, in children aged 7 to 11, [17] adult humans, [18] and adult rats. [19] There is considerable growth within the first few years of structural development in both male and female amygdalae. [20]
Amygdala hijack—threat response to emotional stimulus An amygdala hijack is an emotional response that is immediate, overwhelming, and out of measure with the actual stimulus because it has triggered a much more significant emotional threat. [ 1 ]
The basolateral amygdala and nucleus accumbens shell together mediate specific Pavlovian-instrumental transfer, a phenomenon in which a classically conditioned stimulus modifies operant behavior. [7] [8] One of the main functions of the basolateral complex is to stimulate the fear response. The fear system is intended to avoid pain or injury.
Besides memory, the amygdala also seems to be an important brain region involved in attentional and emotional processes. First, to define attention in cognitive terms, attention is the ability to focus on some stimuli while ignoring others. Thus, the amygdala seems to be an important structure in this ability.
The amygdala connects to the thalamus both through the amygdalofugal pathway and through a direct connection to the dorsomedial nucleus of the thalamus. [13] After leaving the substantia innominata , the ventral amygdalofugal pathway continues on a medial path to enter the septal region, the lateral preoptic area , the hypothalamus , and the ...
In fear conditioning, the main circuits that are involved are the sensory areas that process the conditioned and unconditioned stimuli, certain regions of the amygdala that undergo plasticity (or long-term potentiation) during learning, and the regions that bear an effect on the expression of specific conditioned responses.
The ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) is a part of the prefrontal cortex in the mammalian brain.The ventral medial prefrontal is located in the frontal lobe at the bottom of the cerebral hemispheres and is implicated in the processing of risk and fear, as it is critical in the regulation of amygdala activity in humans. [2]
S.M., sometimes referred to as SM-046, is an American woman with a peculiar type of brain damage that physiologically reduces her ability to feel fear.First described by scientists in 1994, [1] she has had exclusive and complete bilateral amygdala destruction since late childhood as a consequence of Urbach–Wiethe disease.