title: Impaired threat prioritisation after selective bilateral amygdala lesions.
abstract: The amygdala is proposed to process threat-related information in non-human animals. In humans, empirical evidence from lesion studies has provided the strongest evidence for a role in emotional face recognition and social judgement. Here we use a face-in-the-crowd (FITC) task which in healthy control individuals reveals prioritised threat processing, evident in faster serial search for angry compared to happy target faces. We investigate AM and BG, two individuals with bilateral amygdala lesions due to Urbach-Wiethe syndrome, and 16 control individuals. In lesion patients we show a reversal of a threat detection advantage indicating a profound impairment in prioritising threat information. This is the first direct demonstration that human amygdala lesions impair prioritisation of threatening faces, providing evidence that this structure has a causal role in responding to imminent danger.
authors.affiliation: Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, University College London, UK; Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy, and Psychosomatics, University of Zurich, Switzerland. Electronic address: dominik.bach@uzh.ch.
authors.forename: Dominik R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Bach
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Bonn, Germany.
authors.forename: Rene
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Hurlemann
authors.affiliation: Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, University College London, UK.
authors.forename: Raymond J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Dolan
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000679:Amygdala / Q000503:physiopathology*; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005149:Facial Expression; D005239:Fear / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment / Q000502:physiology; D008065:Lipoid Proteinosis of Urbach and Wiethe / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D012938:Social Perception
keywords: Amygdala lesion; Facial expression; Fear; Serial search; Threat; Urbach–Wiethe