Brain Responses to Emotional Communication: Music, Vocalization, Facial Expressions - Paper Example

Aubé, W., Angulo-Perkins, A., Peretz, I., Concha, L., & Armony, J. L. (2015). Fear across the senses: brain responses to music, vocalizations, and facial expressions. Social cognitive and affective neuroscience, 10(3), 399-407.

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Aubé et al. (2015), in their study, examined the fundamental roles of emotional communication in social interactions. Their study focused on music, vocalization, and different forms of facial expressions as the key components. Thus, their study analyzed emotional expressions as a central part in the provision of essential information regarding the active environment of the emitters. Additionally, the analysis conducted in the article revealed that emotional expressions, including the ones propagated through facial and vocalization communication, utilizes the amygdala portion of the brain. The approached used in the study is examining the emotional expressions of subjects. Forty-seven individuals served as the selected sample size for the research. The selection of this study population involved sampling volunteers of good health condition with no hearing impairment issues. For analysis, the subjects were examined using different forms of stimuli, including music, vocalization, and faces. The study found that music serves as an excellent means for the expressions of emotions that several types of research ignored. However, the processing of distinct emotions utilizing stimuli such as emotional music remains an area of further analysis. The findings and results of the study ascertained the significance of fear and anxiety in emotional communication. The article is an essential part of the current research as it studies music, facial expressions, and vocalization as emotional expression stimuli, which is the central focus of the analysis.

Koelsch, S., Skouras, S., Fritz, T., Herrera, P., Bonhage, C., Küssner, M. B., & Jacobs, A. M. (2013). The roles of the superficial amygdala and auditory cortex in music-evoked fear and joy. Neuroimage, 81, 49-60.

Koelsch et al. (2013), in their article, studied the active part that the superficial amygdala, together with the auditory cortex, play in evoking fear and joy through music. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is central to the study. The methodology employed in the study entailed a selection of eighteen individuals that formed the sample population for the analysis. The volunteered study sample took different research tests, including selective listening to music categorized as those evoking fear or joy and neutral music. The research then analyzed and rated the distinct emotional state of the sample study based on valence, fear, arousal, anxiety, and joy or happiness. The results and findings from the study revealed that there were significant changes in the BOLD signal indicating the significance of cognitive behaviors. It was evident from the study that BOLD signals demonstrated a rising action during joy as opposed to that of fear, which had a falling or decreasing trend when examining the scenarios against the condition. These were the conditions of the bilateral auditory cortex (AC) and bilateral superficial amygdala (SF). The investigation conducted on the functions of the amygdaloid complex, as well as that of the auditory cortex, is critically essential in the current study. Therefore, the article is a vital research tool for studying cognition, emotion, and motivation as it offers resourceful information on joyful, fearful, and neutral music.

Lewis, A. K., Porter, M. A., Williams, T. A., Bzishvili, S., North, K. N., & Payne, J. M. (2017). Facial emotion recognition, face scan paths, and face perception in children with neurofibromatosis type 1. Neuropsychology, 31(4), 361.

The face scan paths and perception abilities, particularly for children struggling with Neurofibromatosis Type 1 (NF1), formed the basis for this study. The research focused on studying the relationship that the two have regarding the emotional cognitive aspect of these children. Therefore, to effectively complete the study, the researchers used a method that utilized 29 children with NF1 as a sample study and compared that with the corresponding 29 control subjects. The method examined differences and unique aspects of facial emotion recognition, face scan paths, and perception if the study and control subjects. The findings and results of the study revealed that children struggling with NF1 possess inferior recognition and expression of emotions of fear and anger. Moreover, the study indicated that there existed no significant difference between the research groups regarding the duration of viewing distinct core facial features. In addition to that, children with NF1 had inferior face perception capacities compared to the controls. The results of the study form an essential part of analyzing the social-cognitive phenotype of neurofibromatosis, thereby a vital resource for the current research.

Smith, R., & Lane, R. D. (2015). The neural basis of one’s own conscious and unconscious emotional states. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 57, 1-29.

Smith & Lane (2015), in their article, studied the neural makeup of an individual by focusing on the conscious and unconscious aspects of emotional state. The research used a methodology that relied on the analysis of the three interrelating hierarchical neural systems that play active roles in the creation, perception, and regulation of an individual’s emotional state. The findings and results of the research indicated that emotion generation occurs through sequencing appraisal mechanisms that need high-level computational processing compared to others. The results of the study indicated that an individual’s emotions entail a series or stages of an interceptive process that is essential for detecting and assigning conceptual, emotional communication to the body state patterns. The article is a vital research tool for the current study as it seeks to define emotion in terms of a hierarchical control system.

Sturm, V. E., Yokoyama, J. S., Eckart, J. A., Zakrzewski, J., Rosen, H. J., Miller, B. L., ... & Levenson, R. W. (2015). Damage to left frontal regulatory circuits produces greater positive emotional reactivity in frontotemporal dementia. Cortex, 64, 55-67.

The positive emotions are the focus of the research. It seeks to explore the different areas of positive emotions, among them, being happiness, amusement, enthusiasm, nurturing love, and passion, among others. Additionally, the study examined the different impacts of positive emotions on social functions. The methodology used in the research entailed a critical examination of the selected study sample of 96 patients who were central in the reactivity analysis. The selected sample for the study were individuals with front temporal dementia (FTD). As part of the method of the study, the selected participants had to watch clips aimed at evoking happiness as well as that evoking sadness. Then the researchers monitored the respective facial traits, physiological reactivity, and the associated self-reported emotional involvement. The findings and conclusion of the study were that atrophy, particularly in the left hemisphere frontostriatal emotion regulation systems, played a pivotal role in differential behaviors. Moreover, the result proved that there were higher chances of increase happiness due to selective damage occurring in the left frontostriatal emotion regulating systems. Therefore, the article is a key study tool for the current research as it examines the results of damages on frontal regulatory circuits, which is a key part of the topic under analysis.

Summary of the Signature Assignment Topic

Cognition, emotion, and motivation are the backbones of psychological study. The most basic components of emotions include fear, happiness, pleasure, anger, and disgust, among others. Different external forces, such as music, have unique effects on these emotions. For instance, different forms of music can either evoke fear or joy. Therefore, emotions occur as a result of different adaptive behavior. Understanding the brain and human interaction with the external environment forms the basis for behavioral research, physiology, and psychology. The study of emotions stems from the researches on cognition, emotion, and motivation. The study focuses on establishing a comprehensive knowledge of the emotional processes in light of their mechanisms, functions, and evolutionary significance.

The neuropsychological research of the topic deals with the different ways that the brain responds to stimuli of music, vocalizations, and facial expressions, among others. It also examines the different scholarly works on conscious and unconscious states of human emotions, the scientific principles behind the functions of superficial amygdala, frontal regulatory circuits, and the auditory cortex, and how they relate to external stimuli. Other areas of focus of the analysis include the recognition of emotions, especially through studying neurofibromatosis type 1 among children to determine facial emotion recognition, face scan paths, and face perception.

References

Aubé, W., Angulo-Perkins, A., Peretz, I., Concha, L., & Armony, J. L. (2015). Fear across the senses: brain responses to music, vocalizations, and facial expressions. Social cognitive and affective neuroscience, 10(3), 399-407. https://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsu067

Koelsch, S., Skouras, S., Fritz, T., Herrera, P., Bonhage, C., Küssner, M. B., & Jacobs, A. M. (2013). The roles of the superficial amygdala and auditory cortex in music-evoked fear and joy. Neuroimage, 81, 49-60. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2013.05.008

Lewis, A. K., Porter, M. A., Williams, T. A., Bzishvili, S., North, K. N., & Payne, J. M. (2017). Facial emotion recognition, face scan paths, and face perception in children with neurofibromatosis type 1. Neuropsychology, 31(4), 361. https://doi.org/10.1037/neu0000340

Smith, R., & Lane, R. D. (2015). The neural basis of one’s own conscious and unconscious emotional states. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 57, 1-29. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2015.08.003

Sturm, V. E., Yokoyama, J. S., Eckart, J. A., Zakrzewski, J., Rosen, H. J., Miller, B. L., ... & Levenson, R. W. (2015). Damage to left frontal regulatory circuits produces greater positive emotional reactivity in frontotemporal dementia. Cortex, 64, 55-67. DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2014.10.002