Response and recovery in the brain may predict well-being Feb.
4, 2013 It has long been known that the part of the brain called
the amygdala is responsible for recognition of a threat and
knowing whether to fight or flee from the danger. Now, using
functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, scientists at
the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison Waisman Center are watching the duration of
the amygdala response in the brains of healthy people when
exposed to negative images. How long the recovery takes may be
an indicator of personality traits like neuroticism. Recently
published in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective
Neuroscience, the study specifically examines how the amygdala
responds and recovers from negative stimuli. One of the more
primitive parts of the mammalian brain, the amygdala is central
to processing emotion, including activating changes in the body
that often accompany emotion. In terms of its evolutionary
function, this region of the brain i