Techniques and methodsExperience-dependent plasticity for attention to threat: Behavioral and neurophysiological evidence in humans
Section snippets
Methods and materials
Twenty-one adults participated in Experiment 1 (9 females; mean age = 29.57 years; SD = 3.09). Twenty-three adolescents participated in Experiment 2 (14 females; mean age = 12.87 years; SD = 2.14). This study included adolescents to evaluate the generalizability of the findings. Another sample of 12 adults participated in Experiment 3 (6 females; mean age = 30.58 years; SD = 3.53). All subjects provided written informed consent/assent for participation after being informed of the risks, as well
Results
For behavioral data, we performed a mixed-model repeated-measures analysis for reaction time. Time and the four levels of trial type (the angry face on the left or right and the probe on the left or right) served as factors. For Experiment 1, this analysis revealed a time-by-trial-type interaction, F(483, 357) = 1.47, p < .001. Figure 2 illustrates the attention bias over the first three runs and the last run of each of the three experiments. For Experiment 2, adolescents also showed a
Discussion
All three experiments demonstrate behavioral plasticity in the magnitude of bias away from masked angry faces. While fMRI data in Experiment 3 documented engagement of the amygdala, cingulate, and OFC, these activations did not change over time. Rather, behavioral plasticity was associated with a pattern of increasing right OT activation. There are multiple explanations to account for this neurophysiological-behavioral association. Regardless, the data show that learning is accompanied by
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