Personal space regulation by the human amygdala

The amygdala plays key roles in emotion and social cognition, but how this translates to face-to-face interactions involving real people remains unknown. We found that an individual with complete amygdala lesions lacked any sense of personal space. Furthermore, healthy individuals showed amygdala ac...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inNature neuroscience Vol. 12; no. 10; pp. 1226 - 1227
Main Authors Kennedy, Daniel P, Gläscher, Jan, Tyszka, J Michael, Adolphs, Ralph
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published New York Nature Publishing Group US 01.10.2009
Nature Publishing Group
Subjects
Adaptation, Psychological
Adolescent
Adult
Amygdala (Brain)
Amygdala - blood supply
Amygdala - physiopathology
Analysis of Variance
Animal Genetics and Genomics
Behavioral Sciences
Biological Techniques
Biomedical and Life Sciences
Biomedicine
Brain Injuries - pathology
brief-communication
Case-Control Studies
Emotions
Experiments
Female
Genetic aspects
Human acts
Human behavior
Humans
Image Processing, Computer-Assisted
Interpersonal communication
Interpersonal Relations
Magnetic Resonance Imaging - methods
Male
Middle Aged
Neurobiology
Neurosciences
Photic Stimulation - methods
Physiological aspects
Preferences
Psychological aspects
Recognition (Psychology) - physiology
Space Perception - physiology
Time Factors
Young Adult
United States
United States > US
California
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Summary:The amygdala plays key roles in emotion and social cognition, but how this translates to face-to-face interactions involving real people remains unknown. We found that an individual with complete amygdala lesions lacked any sense of personal space. Furthermore, healthy individuals showed amygdala activation upon close personal proximity. The amygdala may be required to trigger the strong emotional reactions normally following personal space violations, thus regulating interpersonal distance in humans.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
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Author Contributions D.P.K. and R.A. designed the experiment and wrote the paper; D.P.K. executed the studies; D.P.K., J.G., and J.M.T. analyzed the data.
ISSN:1097-6256
1546-1726
DOI:10.1038/nn.2381