Biomedical subjects

Fabio Sambataro

Publications and source records attributed to Fabio Sambataro.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Preferential responses in amygdala and insula during presentation of facial contempt and disgust.

Some authors consider contempt to be a basic emotion while others consider it a variant of disgust. The neural correlates of contempt have not so far been specifically contrasted with disgust. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we investigated the neural networks involved in the processing of facial contempt and disgust in 24 healthy subjects. Facial recognition of contempt was lower than that of disgust and of neutral faces. The imaging data indicated significant activity in the amygdala and in globus pallidus and putamen during processing of contemptuous faces. Bilateral insula and caudate nuclei and left as well as right inferior frontal gyrus were engaged during processing of disgusted faces. Moreover, direct comparisons of contempt vs. disgust yielded significantly different activations in the amygdala. On the other hand, disgusted faces elicited greater activation than contemptuous faces in the right insula and caudate. Our findings suggest preferential involvement of different neural substrates in the processing of facial emotional expressions of contempt and disgust.

Adult↗

PubMed2006

Prefrontal-hippocampal coupling during memory processing is modulated by COMT val158met genotype.

BACKGROUND: Studies in humans and in animals have demonstrated that a network of brain regions is involved in performance of declarative and recognition memory tasks. This network includes the hippocampal formation (HF) as well as the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC). Studies in animals have suggested that the relationship between these brain regions is strongly modulated by dopamine. METHODS: Using fMRI in healthy humans matched for a series of demographic and genetic variables, we studied the effect of the COMT val158met polymorphism on function of HF and VLPFC as well as on their functional coupling during recognition memory. RESULTS: The COMT Val allele was associated with: relatively poorer performance at retrieval; reduced recruitment of neuronal resources in HF and increased recruitment in VLPFC during both encoding and retrieval; and unfavorable functional coupling between these two regions at retrieval. Moreover, functional coupling during retrieval was predictive of behavioral accuracy. CONCLUSIONS: These results shed new light on individual differences in responsivity and connectivity between HF and VLPFC related to genetic modulation of dopamine, a mechanism accounting at least in part for individual differences in recognition memory performance.

Adult↗

PubMed2004

Patterns and universals of mate poaching across 53 nations: the effects of sex, culture, and personality on romantically attracting another person's partner.

As part of the International Sexuality Description Project, 16,954 participants from 53 nations were administered an anonymous survey about experiences with romantic attraction. Mate poaching--romantically attracting someone who is already in a relationship--was most common in Southern Europe, South America, Western Europe, and Eastern Europe and was relatively infrequent in Africa, South/Southeast Asia, and East Asia. Evolutionary and social-role hypotheses received empirical support. Men were more likely than women to report having made and succumbed to short-term poaching across all regions, but differences between men and women were often smaller in more gender-egalitarian regions. People who try to steal another's mate possess similar personality traits across all regions, as do those who frequently receive and succumb to the poaching attempts by others. The authors conclude that human mate-poaching experiences are universally linked to sex, culture, and the robust influence of personal dispositions.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Universal sex differences in the desire for sexual variety: tests from 52 nations, 6 continents, and 13 islands.

Evolutionary psychologists have hypothesized that men and women possess both long-term and short-term mating strategies, with men's short-term strategy differentially rooted in the desire for sexual variety. In this article, findings from a cross-cultural survey of 16,288 people across 10 major world regions (including North America, South America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Southern Europe, Middle East, Africa, Oceania, South/Southeast Asia, and East Asia) demonstrate that sex differences in the desire for sexual variety are culturally universal throughout these world regions. Sex differences were evident regardless of whether mean, median, distributional, or categorical indexes of sexual differentiation were evaluated. Sex differences were evident regardless of the measures used to evaluate them. Among contemporary theories of human mating, pluralistic approaches that hypothesize sex differences in the evolved design of short-term mating provide the most compelling account of these robust empirical findings.

Adult↗