Article

The amygdala is a fascinating, complex structure that lies at the center of much
of our current thinking about emotion. Here, I will review data that suggest that
the amygdala is involved in several processes linked to determining what a
stimulus is and what the organism should therefore do - the two questions that
are part of the title. This piece will focus on three main aspects of amygdala
function, namely attention, value representation, and decision making, by
reviewing both non-human and human data. Two mechanisms of affective attention
will be described. The first involves projections from the central nucleus of the
amygdala to the basal forebrain, which has extensive and diffuse projections
throughout the cortical mantle. The second involves projections from the basal
amygdala to multiple levels across the visual cortex. I will also describe how
the basolateral amygdala is important for the representation of value and in
decision making. Overall, it will be argued that the amygdala plays a key role in
solving the following problem: How can a limited-capacity information processing
system that receives a constant stream of diverse inputs be designed to
selectively process those inputs that are most significant to the objectives of
the system? "What is it?" and "What's to be done?" processes can then be viewed
as important building blocks in the construction of emotion,
a process that is
intertwined with cognition. Furthermore, answering the two questions directs how
resources should be mobilized as the organism seeks out additional information
from the environment.
CI - Copyright (c) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Langue : ANGLAIS