Brain Mapping Study Shows Areas Activated by Emotional Control

A new study from the UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Ghent University compares different feelings regarding how individuals choose to suppress emotion when instructed to inhibit one.

"The results shows that emotional self-control involves a quite different brain system from simply being told how to respond emotionally," said lead author Dr Simone Kuhn (Ghent University), according to a press release.

Participants were instructed to feel or inhibit an emotional response. Yet, in everyday life, we are rarely told to suppress our emotions, and usually have to decide ourselves whether to feel or control exactly what we are feeling.

In this new study the researchers showed fifteen healthy women unpleasant or frightening pictures. The participants were given a choice to feel the emotion elicited by the image, or alternatively to inhibit the emotion, by distancing themselves through an act of self-control.

The researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to scan the brains of the participants. They compared this brain activity to another experiment where the participants were instructed to feel or inhibit their emotions, rather than choose for themselves.

Different parts of the brain were activated in the two situations. When participants decided for themselves to inhibit negative emotions, the scientists found activation in the dorso-medial prefrontal area of the brain. They had previously linked this brain area to deciding to inhibit movement.

In contrast, when participants were instructed by the experimenter to inhibit the emotion, a second, more lateral area was activated.

"We think controlling one's emotions and controlling one's behaviour involve overlapping mechanisms," said Dr Kuhn.

"We should distinguish between voluntary and instructed control of emotions, in the same way as we can distinguish between making up our own mind about what do, versus following instructions."

The findings for the study are published in the journal Brain Structure and Function.