title: How functional coupling between the auditory cortex and the amygdala induces musical emotion: a single case study.
abstract: Music is a sound structure of remarkable acoustical and temporal complexity. Although it cannot denote specific meaning, it is one of the most potent and universal stimuli for inducing mood. How the auditory and limbic systems interact, and whether this interaction is lateralized when feeling emotions related to music, remains unclear. We studied the functional correlation between the auditory cortex (AC) and amygdala (AMY) through intracerebral recordings from both hemispheres in a single patient while she listened attentively to musical excerpts, which we compared to passive listening of a sequence of pure tones. While the left primary and secondary auditory cortices (PAC and SAC) showed larger increases in gamma-band responses than the right side, only the right side showed emotion-modulated gamma oscillatory activity. An intra- and inter-hemisphere correlation was observed between the auditory areas and AMY during the delivery of a sequence of pure tones. In contrast, a strikingly right-lateralized functional network between the AC and the AMY was observed to be related to the musical excerpts the patient experienced as happy, sad and peaceful. Interestingly, excerpts experienced as angry, which the patient disliked, were associated with widespread de-correlation between all the structures. These results suggest that the right auditory-limbic interactions result from the formation of oscillatory networks that bind the activities of the network nodes into coherence patterns, resulting in the emergence of a feeling.
authors.affiliation: INS INSERM, UMR U, 1106 Marseilles, France; Aix-Marseille Université, 13005 Marseilles, France. Electronic address: catherine.liegeois-chauvel@univ-amu.fr.
authors.forename: Catherine
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Liégeois-Chauvel
authors.affiliation: INS INSERM, UMR U, 1106 Marseilles, France; Aix-Marseille Université, 13005 Marseilles, France.
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Bénar
authors.affiliation: INS INSERM, UMR U, 1106 Marseilles, France; Aix-Marseille Université, 13005 Marseilles, France.
authors.forename: Julien
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Krieg
authors.affiliation: LEAD UMR 5022 CNRS, Université de Bourgogne, 21065 Dijon, France.
authors.forename: Charles
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Delbé
authors.affiliation: INS INSERM, UMR U, 1106 Marseilles, France; Aix-Marseille Université, 13005 Marseilles, France; Hôpitaux de Marseille, Hôpital de la Timone, 13005 Marseille, France.
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Chauvel
authors.affiliation: INS INSERM, UMR U, 1106 Marseilles, France; Aix-Marseille Université, 13005 Marseilles, France; Hôpitaux de Marseille, Hôpital de la Timone, 13005 Marseille, France.
authors.forename: Bernard
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Giusiano
authors.affiliation: LEAD UMR 5022 CNRS, Université de Bourgogne, 21065 Dijon, France.
authors.forename: Emmanuel
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Bigand
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000679:Amygdala / Q000502:physiology*; D001303:Auditory Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology; D001931:Brain Mapping; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D009146:Music / Q000523:psychology*; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000502:physiology
keywords: Amygdala; Auditory cortex; Emotion; Human; Music