The neural network involved in processing own mother's emotional face

2014 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 24700264
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Cognitive science
• Research Institution: Sapporo Medical University
• Principal Investigator: SHINOZAKI Jun 札幌医科大学, 医学部, 助教 (30510953)
• Project Period (FY): 2012-04-01 – 2015-03-31
• Keywords: 母親顔 / 顔表情認知 / 無意識的知覚 / 閾値下刺激 / 外側眼窩皮質 / 機能的イメージング

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We hypothesized that covert presentation of emotional faces would be affected by the specificity of emotional relationship between mother and children. Twelve female adult subjects participated in the functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study. Stimulus faces were presented subliminally by the backward masking procedure (17 ms presentations of anger or neutral facial expressions plus 483 ms presentations of neutral face). To control familiarity such as friendship, photos of these faces of subject's own female friend were also presented.
The lateral orbitofrontal cortex is related to unconscious perception of own mother's anger face, and not related to familiarity like friendship. Presentation of anger face of own mother in this context can enhance activation of the prefrontal cortex without induction of explicit perception.

Free Research Field

神経科学、認知科学