PSY 236 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Grey Matter, Amygdala, Brainstem
Document Summary
Withdrawal: emotions making us want to pull back (anxiety, depression, etc. ) Volatility: angry hostility, reactive aspects of impulsivity and vulnerability. Triggered by impending non-reward, punishment, novelty , and especially uncertainty. Behaviors of stop, slow-down, freeze, observe, etc. Responds to unconditioned or innately aversive stimuli. Initiated in brain stem with connections to hypothalamus, amygdala and central gray matter. Amygdala: activates behavioral and emotional response to danger, and sends signals to the hypothalamus (prepares organism to attack, escape, or freeze) Hippocampus: involved in the formation of memories, receives inputs from amygdala, stimuli associated with anxiety producing situations, trigger recollections and emotional states. Daily reports of minor stressors and mood for 42 consecutive days. High n exposes individuals to more stress, esp. Strength of reactivity to stressful events twice that of those with low n. 60% of relationships of n to distress had nothing to do with negative events or overly negative reactions to them.
