Amygdala Case Study

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Situated within the temporal lobe, the amygdala is a collection of nucli which are considered to be part of the brain's limbic system. It is believed to be critically involved in emotional behavior and important for the detection and response to threats (L. Pessoa, R. Adolphs, 2010). Promoting a fast and efficient response to a threat through a cortical "alarm system" (Liddell et al., 2005)

Research has shown that amygadala lesions can effect the recognition of fearful facial expressions. Adolphs et al. (1994) found this in his patient, refered to as S.M. During childhood S.M. suffered from a rare genetic condition which resuted in complete bilateral amygdala distruction, with little involvment of any other surrounding structures. She was presented with photographs of faces to which she appeared to have a decreased ability to recognise certain emotions in, prodominantly fearful facial expressions. Later studies conducted with S.M. (Justin S. Feinstein, Ralph Adolphs, Antonio Damasio, 2011) exposed her to fear evoking situations, for example taking her on a tour of a haunted …show more content…
The results found that she didn't outwardly exhibit fear during these situations, she reported feeling nothing more than "minimal levels of fear". Through self questionaires over a period of 3 months, "SM repeatedly demonstrated an absence of overt fear manifestations and an overall impoverished experience of fear" despite her . These abnormal fear responses have also been seen in monkeys (for example,

The Amygdala Case Study

event of a positive or negative situation and what decisions are essential for the business to thrive. Human beings have their own room filled with this much information – in the brain. This particular section of the brain is called the amygdala. The name amygdala originates from the Greek word ‘amygdalē' meaning almond, which is suiting because according to the University of Idaho College…

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II at the hand of another person. (Fox and Delateur, 2008). This information contained numbers for the whole world but the thought of so many people perishing from the acts of violence by another human being should give anyone great concern. Many studies also showed a correlation however of traits in common of those individuals committing such acts of violence leading to death. Traits According to statistics, Caucasian adult males make up over 90% of sudden mass murders in the United States and…

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Essay on Discuss the Interaction Between Cognition and Physiology in Terms of Behavior

Studies using neuro-imaging have concluded that emotional memory relates to the amygdala in the brain, and procedural locates at the striatum and cerebellum. Moving on to a specific study, one was done on a man known as HM. At the age of 9, HM started having uncontrollable epileptic seizures that couldn't be controlled by medication at the time…

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perceive as dangerous (for instance, a snake slithering toward you) and survive the event. So how does it work? Primary Emotion: Introducing Fear Evolution has graced us with the amygdala, an almond-shaped component of the ancient basal ganglia that is involved with aspects of emotion and memory formation. The amygdala allows an instantaneous, unthinking reaction in the face of a threat; sort of a survivomatic autopilot. As Joseph LeDoux says, "When it comes to detecting and responding to danger…

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6PS002 Assesment 1 Presentation Essay

According to Swettenham et al, (1998) early signs of a person having autism include a failure to maintain eye-to-eye contact with other people.  In a study carried out by Rutter (1979) and again by Rapin (1997) it was found that up to 75% of cases of people who have autism also suffer from mental retardation.  It has also been found in a study carried out by Venter et al (1992) that whereas performance on some cognitive tasks is low performance on other tasks can be high .Some autistic people…

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This stage requires retrieving information from the memory bank and in this case the three year old needs to recall how he or she learned how to tie his or her shoe. Similarly, the case of the dog salivating, Ivan Pavlov “began his self-inflicted studies of human verbal learning and memory” (Kimble, 1985, p. 284). Pavlov performed studies testing the intelligence levels of animals. One of his most prominent studies was teaching a dog to salivate at the sound of a bell and that teaching is referred…

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Medford's Theory Of Depersonalization

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The argument between whether or not a serial or psychopathic killer is born or made has been around for quite some time. It’s still hard to determine, but killers are often made through nurture. Murderers have been around for as long as humankind can remember. With a lot of research being done on this subject, it is clear to us that killers often have some brain differences between someone who is considered normal. Killers are often made through nurture due to traumatic experiences, however,…

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