Conservatism and the neural circuitry of threat: economic conservatism predicts greater amygdala-BNST connectivity during periods of threat vs safety. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci 2018 Jan 01;13(1):43-51
Date
11/11/2017Pubmed ID
29126127Pubmed Central ID
PMC5793824DOI
10.1093/scan/nsx133Scopus ID
2-s2.0-85040619655 (requires institutional sign-in at Scopus site) 24 CitationsAbstract
Political conservatism is associated with an increased negativity bias, including increased attention and reactivity toward negative and threatening stimuli. Although the human amygdala has been implicated in the response to threatening stimuli, no studies to date have investigated whether conservatism is associated with altered amygdala function toward threat. Furthermore, although an influential theory posits that connectivity between the amygdala and bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST) is important in initiating the response to sustained or uncertain threat, whether individual differences in conservatism modulate this connectivity is unknown. To test whether conservatism is associated with increased reactivity in neural threat circuitry, we measured participants' self-reported social and economic conservatism and asked them to complete high-resolution fMRI scans while under threat of an unpredictable shock and while safe. We found that economic conservatism predicted greater connectivity between the BNST and a cluster of voxels in the left amygdala during threat vs safety. These results suggest that increased amygdala-BNST connectivity during threat may be a key neural correlate of the enhanced negativity bias found in conservatism.
Author List
Pedersen WS, Muftuler LT, Larson CLAuthor
Lutfi Tugan Muftuler PhD Professor in the Neurosurgery department at Medical College of WisconsinMESH terms used to index this publication - Major topics in bold
AmygdalaAnimals
Anxiety
Arousal
Dominance, Cerebral
Economics
Fear
Female
Humans
Individuality
Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Male
Nerve Net
Politics
Safety
Septal Nuclei
Statistics as Topic
Uncertainty
Young Adult
