Attentional capture by emotional stimuli is preserved in patients with amygdala lesions
Citation:
Richard M. Piech, Maureen McHugo, Stephen D. Smith, Mildred S. Dukic, Joost Van Der Meer, Bassel Abou-Khalil, Steven B. Most, & David H. Zald, Attentional capture by emotional stimuli is preserved in patients with amygdala lesions, Neuropsychologia, 49, 12, 2011, 3314-3319Download Item:
Abstract:
The importance of cues signaling reward, threat or danger would suggest that they receive processing privileges in the neural systems underlying perception and attention. Previous research has documented enhanced processing of motivationally salient cues, and has pointed to the amygdala as a candidate neutral structure underlying the enhancements. In the current study, we examined whether the amygdala was necessary for this emotional modulation of attention to occur. Patients with unilateral amygdala lesions and matched controls completed an emotional attentional blink task in which emotional distractors impair the perception of subsequent targets. Emotional images proved more distracting across all participant groups, including those with right or left amygdala lesions. These data argue against a central role for the amygdala in mediating all types of attentional capture by emotional stimuli.
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Grant Number
National Institutes of Health (NIH)
5R01MH74567-4
Author's Homepage:
http://people.tcd.ie/piechrDescription:
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Author: PIECH, RICHARD
Publisher:
ElsevierType of material:
Journal ArticleSeries/Report no:
Neuropsychologia;49;
12;
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Full text availableKeywords:
Neuroscience, amygdalaMetadata
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