The understanding of the brain mechanisms of emotion and motivation has grown steadily in the past two decades. The majority of the work in the rodent and human literatures has relied heavily on particular paradigms, such as the perception of faces with emotion content in humans, and aversive conditioning procedures in both humans and animals. The present application proposes a series of experimental paradigms that are ecologically inspired, semi- naturalistic, and dynamic. The objective of this application is to investigate the dynamics of threat processing during escape behaviors, as well as the dynamics of threat/reward processing during approach- avoid conflict paradigms. Across experiments, we seek to both characterize and test specific hypotheses centered around a set of brain regions implicated in aversive and appetitive processing. We seek to characterize their contributions individually but also as distributed circuits that collectively and dynamically support behaviors. The proposed work is organized around two aims.
Aim 1 investigates the circuits supporting threat escape. Rodent studies suggest that the ventral striatum/accumbens is an important node during escape behaviors. Whereas some work in humans (e.g., avoidance conditioning) supports this notion, other work with ethologically inspired paradigms has also revealed the participation of regions such as the mid-cingulate cortex and the anterior hippocampus. Experiments will test the contributions of these and other brain regions to escape mechanisms.
Aim 2 investigates the circuits involved in aversive and appetitive interactions during dynamic threat and reward processing. Experiments will employ dynamic stimuli where the proximity to threat and reward vary dynamically. Collectively, the work addresses a set of basic research questions aimed at understanding how emotion/motivation circuits outlined in the past decades supports dynamic processing. The potential results may inform the clinically-oriented human literature, which has been heavily informed and inspired by research with standard experimental paradigms.

Public Health Relevance

This project aims to study emotion and motivation in the human brain of typical participants with functional magnetic resonance imaging. We will study mechanisms of escaping from threat and approaching reward and how they interact. The project attempts to contribute to the understanding to processes that support many human behaviors, and may inform potential treatments of conditions such as anxiety disorders and substance abuse.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
2R01MH071589-16
Application #
10058351
Study Section
Cognition and Perception Study Section (CP)
Program Officer
Vicentic, Aleksandra
Project Start
2004-06-19
Project End
2025-06-30
Budget Start
2020-08-20
Budget End
2021-06-30
Support Year
16
Fiscal Year
2020
Total Cost
Indirect Cost
Name
University of Maryland College Park
Department
Psychology
Type
Schools of Arts and Sciences
DUNS #
790934285
City
College Park
State
MD
Country
United States
Zip Code
20742
Padmala, Srikanth; Sambuco, Nicola; Codispoti, Maurizio et al. (2018) Attentional capture by simultaneous pleasant and unpleasant emotional distractors. Emotion 18:1189-1194
Liu, Chihuang; JaJa, Joseph; Pessoa, Luiz (2018) LEICA: Laplacian eigenmaps for group ICA decomposition of fMRI data. Neuroimage 169:363-373
Meyer, Christian; Padmala, Srikanth; Pessoa, Luiz (2018) Dynamic Threat Processing. J Cogn Neurosci :1-21
Venkatesh, Manasij; Jaja, Joseph; Pessoa, Luiz (2018) Brain dynamics and temporal trajectories during task and naturalistic processing. Neuroimage 186:410-423
Pessoa, Luiz (2018) Embracing integration and complexity: placing emotion within a science of brain and behaviour. Cogn Emot :1-6
Gentry, Ronny N; Roesch, Matthew R (2018) Neural Activity in Ventral Medial Prefrontal Cortex Is Modulated More Before Approach Than Avoidance During Reinforced and Extinction Trial Blocks. J Neurosci 38:4584-4597
Pessoa, Luiz (2018) Understanding emotion with brain networks. Curr Opin Behav Sci 19:19-25
Pessoa, Luiz (2017) A Network Model of the Emotional Brain. Trends Cogn Sci 21:357-371
Pessoa, Luiz (2017) Do Intelligent Robots Need Emotion? Trends Cogn Sci 21:817-819
Padmala, Srikanth; Sirbu, Mihai; Pessoa, Luiz (2017) Potential reward reduces the adverse impact of negative distractor stimuli. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci 12:1402-1413

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