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Common and specific brain responses to scenic emotional stimuli

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Abstract

Processing of emotions has been an enduring topic of interest in neuroimaging research, but studies have mostly used facial emotional stimuli. The aim of this study was to determine neural networks involved in emotion processing using scenic emotional visual stimuli. One hundred and twenty photographs from the International Affective Picture System (IAPS), including ecological scenes of disgust, fear, happiness, and sadness, were presented to 40 healthy participants while they underwent functional magnetic imaging resonance (fMRI). Afterwards they evaluated the emotional content of the pictures in an offline task. The occipito-temporal cortex and the amygdala–hippocampal complex showed a non-specific emotion-related activation, which was more marked in response to negative emotions than to happiness. The temporo-parietal cortex and the ventral anterior cingulate gyrus showed deactivation, with the former being marked for all emotions except fear and the latter being most marked for disgust. The fusiform gyrus showed activation in response to disgust and deactivation in response to happiness or sadness. Brain regions involved in processing of scenic emotion therefore resemble those reported for facial expressions of emotion in that they respond to a range of different emotions, although there appears to be specificity in the intensity and direction of the response.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Salud Mental (CIBERSAM), the Catalonian Government (2009SGR211 to the Research Unit of Benito Menni) and the Instituto de Salud Carlos III (Río Hortega research contract to Dr. Radua (CM11/00024); Miguel Servet research contracts to Drs. Salvador (CP07/00048) and Pomarol-Clotet (CP10/00596); Intensification grant to Dr. Sarró (10/231); and Research Projects to Drs. Pomarol-Clotet (PI10/01058) and Salvador (PI05/1874)).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest in relation to the present manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. FIDMAG Research Unit, Benito Menni CASM, Carrer d’Antoni Pujadas 38, Sant Boi de Llobregat, 08830, Barcelona, Spain

    Joaquim Radua, Salvador Sarró, Teresa Vigo, Silvia Alonso-Lana, Jordi Ortiz-Gil, Erick J. Canales-Rodríguez, Peter J. Mckenna, Raymond Salvador & Edith Pomarol-Clotet

  2. Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London, London, UK

    Joaquim Radua

  3. Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de Salud Mental (CIBERSAM), Madrid, Spain

    Joaquim Radua, Salvador Sarró, Silvia Alonso-Lana, C. Mar Bonnín, Jordi Ortiz-Gil, Erick J. Canales-Rodríguez, Teresa Maristany, Eduard Vieta, Peter J. Mckenna, Raymond Salvador & Edith Pomarol-Clotet

  4. Benito Menni Complex Assistencial en Salut Mental, Sant Boi de Llobregat, Barcelona, Spain

    Teresa Vigo & Peter J. Mckenna

  5. Hospital Clinic Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain

    C. Mar Bonnín & Eduard Vieta

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  1. Joaquim Radua
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  2. Salvador Sarró
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  3. Teresa Vigo
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  4. Silvia Alonso-Lana
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Joaquim Radua.

Appendix

Appendix

Pictures of the International Affective Picture System (IAPS) used in the fMRI task:

Disgust: 1111, 1280, 1945, 2720, 7359, 7361, 7380, 9008, 9140, 9290, 9300, 9301, 9320, 9330, 9342, 9373, 9500, 9570, 9571 and 9830.

Fear: 1052, 1300, 1301, 1303, 1525, 1726, 1932, 2811, 5940, 6211, 6230, 6244, 6260, 6300, 6370, 6510, 6825, 7640, 9600 and 9620.

Happiness: 1340, 1441, 1463, 1811, 2154, 2216, 2332, 2345, 2391, 5201, 5551, 5600, 5760, 5811, 5831, 5833, 8170, 8190, 8496 and 8540.

Sadness: 2053, 2141, 2205, 2312, 2455, 2520, 2590, 2700, 2703, 2718, 2750, 2799, 3220, 3230, 3300, 3350, 9220, 9415, 9421 and 9435.

Neutral scenes: 2383, 2393, 2575, 5471, 5520, 5534, 5535, 6150, 7002, 7004, 7009, 7010, 7025, 7035, 7036, 7037, 7041, 7050, 7059, 7080, 7100, 7130, 7140, 7161, 7175, 7186, 7205, 7211, 7217, 7224, 7233, 7235, 7491, 7495, 7500, 7503, 7510, 7595, 7950 and 2745.1.

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Radua, J., Sarró, S., Vigo, T. et al. Common and specific brain responses to scenic emotional stimuli. Brain Struct Funct 219, 1463–1472 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00429-013-0580-0

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