DFG Research Unit 1581
Project Profile P6
Effects of Attentional Modulation on Learning and Brain Activation Patterns in the Renewal Effect of Extinction, Measured by fMRI
It is assumed that extinction learning occurs in a network of prefrontal, hippocampal and amygdalar regions. Probably only a subset of these regions also participates in the renewal effect (i.e. the reoccurrence of a previously extinguished response in situations where the test context differs from the extinction context). So far, little is known about about the roles of neural systems and neurotransmitters especially in non-fear related extinction learning and in the renewal effect. Therefore we investigate how learning performance and brain activation patterns in extinction and in the renewal effect of extinction are influenced by manipulations of the learning ability and the attentional status of healthy human participants. Manipulations are generated by several adrenergic/noradrenergic, dopaminergic and N-Methyl-D-Aspartate (NMDA) receptor agonists and antagonists, while the participants execute a predicitve learning task during which fMRI is recorded.
Special interests are:
- To visualise brain activations during the three critical parts of the experiment (acquisition, extinction, renewal)
- To find out which brain regions are crucial for a given aspect of the learning process
- To find out which neurotransmitter systems affect extinction and renewal
Method:
We investigate the role of crucial brain areas during acquisition, extinction and renewal using a combination of
- fMRI
- pharmacological intervention
- behavioral data deriving from a predictive learning task.
Subjects: Humans
Cooperation within the Research Unit:
- Project P1: Employs a similar paradigm in pigeons
- Project P4: Provides the experimental behavioral paradigm, which is adapted for event-related fMRI. In addition, P4 manipulates attention by distracting elements whereas we use pharmacological manipulation.
- Project P5: Uses the same paradigm focusing on effects caused by NA agonists and stress-induced NA release, which allows comparing the results.
- Project P7: Uses the same experimental paradigm.
- Project P8: Uses the same experimental paradigm and will cooperate with us with regard to the analysis of cerebellar activities from our data.
Contact: In case of any questions regarding P6 please contact Dr. Silke Lissek: Silke.Lissek@rub.de
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