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. 2009;4(8):e6726.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0006726. Epub 2009 Aug 25.

The temporal dynamics of voluntary emotion regulation

Henrik Walter  1 , Alexander von Kalckreuth, Dina Schardt, Achim Stephan, Thomas Goschke, Susanne Erk
Affiliations

The temporal dynamics of voluntary emotion regulation

Henrik Walter et al. PLoS One. 2009.

Abstract

Background: Neuroimaging has demonstrated that voluntary emotion regulation is effective in reducing amygdala activation to aversive stimuli during regulation. However, to date little is known about the sustainability of these neural effects once active emotion regulation has been terminated.

Methodology/principal findings: We addressed this issue by means of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in healthy female subjects. We performed an active emotion regulation task using aversive visual scenes (task 1) and a subsequent passive viewing task using the same stimuli (task 2). Here we demonstrate not only a significantly reduced amygdala activation during active regulation but also a sustained regulation effect on the amygdala in the subsequent passive viewing task. This effect was related to an immediate increase of amygdala signal in task 1 once active emotion regulation has been terminated: The larger this peak postregulation signal in the amygdala in task 1, the smaller the sustained regulation effect in task 2.

Conclusions/significance: In summary, we found clear evidence that effects of voluntary emotion regulation extend beyond the period of active regulation. These findings are of importance for the understanding of emotion regulation in general, for disorders of emotion regulation and for psychotherapeutic interventions.

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Task 1 (active regulation).
Upper row left: Amygdala activation was significantly attenuated during regulation (p<0.05 FWE corrected for ROI). This regulation related decrease of amygdala activation was positively correlated with a regulation related increase in DLPFC activation (Upper row, right). Bottom row, left: Time course of left Amygdala, showing a significant postregulation rebound and a significant interaction of regulation and period (bar plot bottom row, middle). Note: all effects here shown for the left amygdala, are also significant for the right amygdala. Bottom row, right: Positive correlation between peak activation during relax period (rebound) in left amygdala and individual scores in the WBSI.
Figure 2
Figure 2. Task 2 (passive viewing).
Upper row: Sustained downregulation of amygdala activation for formerly regulated negative pictures (p<0.05 FWE corrected for ROI; this effect was also significant for the left amygdala (not shown here)). Bottom row: Amygdala activation during presentation of formerly regulated negative pictures in task 2 correlated positively with individual differences in peak rebound activation in task 1 (p<0.05, FWE corrected for ROI; this effect was also significant at a lower statistical level (p = 0.008 uncorrected) for the left amygdala (not shown here)).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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