Cross-species affective neuroscience decoding of the primal affective experiences of humans and related animals.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The issue of whether other animals have internally felt experiences has vexed animal behavioral science since its inception. Although most investigators remain agnostic on such contentious issues, there is now abundant experimental evidence indicating that all mammals have negatively and positively-valenced emotional networks concentrated in homologous brain regions that mediate affective experiences when animals are emotionally aroused. That is what the neuroscientific evidence indicates.

Principal findings

The relevant lines of evidence are as follows: 1) It is easy to elicit powerful unconditioned emotional responses using localized electrical stimulation of the brain (ESB); these effects are concentrated in ancient subcortical brain regions. Seven types of emo

SUBMITTER: Panksepp J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3168430 | biostudies-literature | 2011

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature