Anxiety-related circuitry in affective neuroscience

Abstract

We review the neurological bases of emotions and anxiety-related behavior, integrating contributions from the medical, biological, cognitive neuroscience, and psychological sciences. In particular, we discuss recent affective neuroscience of anxiety-related neurological circuits and metabolic-neuroendocrine systems and their dynamic interaction. This interaction is a delicate process during which can render the brain more capable of reacting to anxiety in adaptive or maladaptive into the most critical deficit in emotional regulation associated with risk for psychopathological conditions. The essence of this associated risk involves the reciprocal influence between hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal function, the relay nucleus within the amygdala reactivation, and the hippocampus as essential structures associated with the forebrain pathways mediating threat-induced hormones and the γ-aminobutyric acid neurotransmitter system as central to the regulation of anxiety. To understand how related emotional experience occurs on the neural level and its impact on cognition and behavior requires mapping the multi-step process of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and the hormones released by each of these structures through interactions between threat-sensitive brain circuitry and the responsivity of neuroendocrine fear-system.