title: Dynamic modulation of amygdala-hippocampal connectivity by emotional arousal.
abstract: Positive and negative emotional events are better remembered than neutral events. Studies in animals suggest that this phenomenon depends on the influence of the amygdala upon the hippocampus. In humans, however, it is largely unknown how these two brain structures functionally interact and whether these interactions are similar between positive and negative information. Using dynamic causal modeling of fMRI data in 586 healthy subjects, we show that the strength of the connection from the amygdala to the hippocampus was rapidly and robustly increased during the encoding of both positive and negative pictures in relation to neutral pictures. We also observed an increase in connection strength from the hippocampus to the amygdala, albeit at a smaller scale. These findings indicate that, during encoding, emotionally arousing information leads to a robust increase in effective connectivity from the amygdala to the hippocampus, regardless of its valence.
authors.affiliation: Division of Cognitive Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland, Division of Molecular Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland, matthias.fastenrath@unibas.ch dominique.dequervain@unibas.ch.
authors.forename: Matthias
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fastenrath
authors.affiliation: Division of Cognitive Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland, Division of Molecular Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Coynel
authors.affiliation: Division of Cognitive Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland, Division of Molecular Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Klara
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Spalek
authors.affiliation: Division of Molecular Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland, Psychiatric University Clinics, University of Basel, 4012 Basel, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Annette
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3933-3289
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Milnik
authors.affiliation: Division of Cognitive Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland, Division of Molecular Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Leo
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Gschwind
authors.affiliation: Radboud University Nijmegen, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience and Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, 6525 EZ Nijmegen, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Benno
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Roozendaal
authors.affiliation: Division of Molecular Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland, Psychiatric University Clinics, University of Basel, 4012 Basel, Switzerland, Department Biozentrum, Life Sciences Training Facility, University of Basel, 4056 Basel, Switzerland, and Transfaculty Research Platform, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Papassotiropoulos
authors.affiliation: Division of Cognitive Neuroscience, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland, Psychiatric University Clinics, University of Basel, 4012 Basel, Switzerland, Transfaculty Research Platform, University of Basel, 4055 Basel, Switzerland matthias.fastenrath@unibas.ch dominique.dequervain@unibas.ch.
authors.forename: Dominique J F
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: de Quervain
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000679:Amygdala / Q000502:physiology*; D001143:Arousal / Q000502:physiology*; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006624:Hippocampus / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000502:physiology; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: amygdala; dynamic causal modeling; effective connectivity; emotion; hippocampus; memory