Emotional automaticity is a matter of timing.
There has been a long controversy concerning whether the amygdala's response to emotional stimuli is automatic or dependent on attentional load. Using magnoencephalography and an advanced beamformer source localization technique, we found that amygdala automaticity was a function of time: while early amygdala responding to emotional stimuli (40-140 ms) was unaffected by attentional load, later amygdala response (280-410 ms), subsequent to frontoparietal cortex activity, was modulated by attentional load.
Luo
Qian
Q
Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland 20892, USA. luoj@mail.nih.gov
Holroyd
Tom
T
Majestic
Catherine
C
Cheng
Xi
X
Schechter
Julia
J
Blair
R James
RJ
D000328:Adult; D000679:Amygdala / Q000502:physiology*; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology*; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015225:Magnetoencephalography; D008297:Male; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000502:physiology; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011930:Reaction Time; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted; D013997:Time Factors; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology; D055815:Young Adult