Ventromedial prefrontal cortex mediates visual attention during facial emotion recognition.
Ventromedial prefrontal cortex mediates visual attention during facial emotion recognition.
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DOI：
10.1093/brain/awu063
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发表时间：
2014-06
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
Richard C. Wolf;C. Philippi;Julian C. Motzkin;M. Başkaya;M. Koenigs
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Richard C. Wolf;C. Philippi;Julian C. Motzkin;M. Başkaya;M. Koenigs
众所周知，腹内侧前额叶皮层在调节人类社会和情感行为方面起着至关重要的作用，但它实现这一广泛功能的确切机制尚不清楚。鉴于之前的神经心理学研究主要集中在腹内侧前额叶皮层在与评估和决策相关的高阶审议过程中的作用，我们在这里测试腹内侧前额叶皮层是否也可能在将注意力定向到社会和情感上有意义的刺激的更基本方面至关重要。在一组损伤患者的面部情绪识别测试中，我们使用眼动追踪技术发现，双侧腹内侧前额叶皮层损伤会损害对面部眼部区域的视觉注意力，尤其是对恐惧的脸。这一发现证明了腹内侧前额叶皮层的一个迄今未被认识到的功能——控制眼球运动的基本注意过程。
The ventromedial prefrontal cortex is known to play a crucial role in regulating human social and emotional behaviour, yet the precise mechanisms by which it subserves this broad function remain unclear. Whereas previous neuropsychological studies have largely focused on the role of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex in higher-order deliberative processes related to valuation and decision-making, here we test whether ventromedial prefrontal cortex may also be critical for more basic aspects of orienting attention to socially and emotionally meaningful stimuli. Using eye tracking during a test of facial emotion recognition in a sample of lesion patients, we show that bilateral ventromedial prefrontal cortex damage impairs visual attention to the eye regions of faces, particularly for fearful faces. This finding demonstrates a heretofore unrecognized function of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex-the basic attentional process of controlling eye movements to faces expressing emotion.