The Child Study Center's 2006 Lois Bloom Lecture

ORDER AND DISORDER IN THE EMOTIONAL BRAIN

Richard J. Davidson

W.M. Keck Laboratory for Functional Brain Imaging
and Behavior
Laboratory for Affective Neuroscience
University of Wisconsin-Madison

       Among the most salient characteristics of emotion in primates, and in humans in particular, is the pronounced variability among individuals in how they respond to emotional challenges in their environment. Some individuals are resilient in the face of stressful life events while others are more vulnerable. These latter individuals frequently decompensate into frank psychopathology and exhibit abnormalities in peripheral biological systems that may be associated with physical illness. This variability among individuals we have termed affective style. Some of the brain bases of affective style will be described with an emphasis on prefrontal cortex and the amygdala. Relations between individual differences in the functioning of these key brain regions and peripheral biological processes that are important to health will also be illustrated. One of the key processes that influence variations in affective style is emotion regulation. A paradigm for the study of emotion regulation in the laboratory will be described. New fMRI data on patterns of emotion regulation in normal individuals and how such patterns differ in patients with major depression will be presented. Finally, the talk will end with a discussion of plasticity in these neural circuits and a consideration of the prospects of transforming affective style toward more beneficial outcomes.