title: A test for the implementation-maintenance model of reappraisal.
abstract: Reappraisal has been defined as a conscious, deliberate change in the way an emotional stimulus is interpreted, initiated in order to change its emotion-eliciting character (Gross, 2002). Reappraisal can be used to down-regulate negative emotions, including anxiety (reviewed in Kalisch, 2009). There is currently a strong interest in identifying the cognitive processes and neural substrates that mediate reappraisal. We have recently proposed a model (termed implementation-maintenance model or IMMO) that conceptualizes reappraisal as a temporally extended, dynamic, and multi-componential process (Kalisch, 2009). A key tenet of IMMO is that reappraisal episodes are marked by an early phase of implementation that may comprise strategy selection and retrieval of reappraisal material into working memory, and a later phase of maintenance that may comprise working memory and performance monitoring processes. These should be supported by dissociable neural networks. We here show, using a detachment-from-threat paradigm and concurrent functional magnetic resonance imaging, that reappraisal-related brain activity shifts from left posterior to right anterior parts of the lateral frontal cortex during the course of a reappraisal episode. Our data provide first empirical evidence for the existence of two separable reappraisal stages. Implications for further model development are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Institute for Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE) Hamburg, Germany.
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Paret
authors.forename: Jessica
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Brenninkmeyer
authors.forename: Benjamin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Meyer
authors.forename: Kenneth S L
authors.initials: KS
authors.lastname: Yuen
authors.forename: Nina
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Gartmann
authors.forename: Marie-Luise
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Mechias
authors.forename: Raffael
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kalisch