Tag Archives: Gerry Vassar

Anger, The Amygdalae, Basal Ganglia, and Prefrontal Cortex

Brain, Feeling, Science, , , , , ,

Amygdalae, the basal ganglia, and the brain diagram.  The diagram is from this link.

d 17-AUG-2015

There are two amygdalae, one on each side of the brain, each attached to a basal ganglion, one on each side of the brain.

The amygdala exists in the brain as two almond shaped organs, referred in their plural  as amygdalae.  They  receive all kinds of internal and sensory inputs, on which they quickly perform pain-related pattern recognition, and assemble “combinatorial memories of pain-related patterns”.

This statement  from Gerry Vassar’s online article, The Amygdala & Emotions , also tells us that the amygdala makes this pattern perception within 20  milliseconds (msec), whereas we are aware of the associated perception within 300 milliseconds.  A psychiatric neuropharmacologist,  (Personal communication, 2015) said that parts of the brain recognize  inputs within 33 msec.  The unchecked amygdala produces ” quick and dirty — knee jerk responses”, fight or flight, which can be quieted by the rest of the basal ganglion of which it is a part.  My psychiatric neuropharmacologist source  also said that

“we generally think of the prefrontal cortex as being the main modulator of the amygdala, although those signals may travel through the basal ganglia first…  ”

(  Anger is one of the responses of the brain.   The speed with which the amygdala reacts to incoming information explains the speed with which we get angry.

The rest of Vassar’s article contains very interesting, rich and concise information about the brain, which is useful to anyone on a  personal level.

The patterns representing the danger are already present in brain.  I think of all patterns in the brain as sets of “mind points”, my own descriptive term.  I am happy to have some anatomical and functional information to integrate with what I already know from my general experience.

One of my grandmothers said that the way to have a good, long, healthy,  or positive life was to “Keep your feet warm, and your head cool.”  I have to control my amygdala in order to do that.

 

 

The Brain On Anger

Brain, Experience, Thought, , ,

brain I borrowed this image on the brain from a post on imagination as an internal sense in the brain on copiosa.org.

We have all experienced anger.  We know what it is, and we know how we are when we are angry.   We have seen a lot of it among the public concerned about particular issues.  We have seen it in presidential candidates.   The blog post below suggests that we need to take a time out of perhaps 20 minutes before we engage activity that is consequential to ourselves or others.

As a hospital staff worker, one of the trainings we had to undergo was on how to de-escalate tensions when somebody threatens violence, perhaps in a hospital emergency room.  We were told that this is one of the most dangerous places in the hospital, and that to reduce tensions one should always face the person, and keep one’s hands in front of one, palms up.

What happens in the brain when we become angry?  Gerry Vassar, in 2011, explained that all senses feed into the amygdala which decides whether to send the information to the thinking part of the brain, the cortex, or to the reactive part of the brain, the limbic system.

The post on Maya Angelou’s book “Why the Caged Bird Sings“, describes an angry person, who recovered from his anger, and went on to make smart decisions about his life.   A person constantly motivated by anger would most pose a risk to our nation, should he become president.