Estudio mediante funcional de resonancia magnetica (fMRI) de las activaciones emotivas correlacionadas a la presentacion de rostros extranos o del propio rostro en sujetos con personalidad inward y outward.

Introduction: Due to patterns of reciprocity based on steady and coherent behaviours or, on the contrary, on articulate and changing behaviours, attachment relationships produce personal meaning organizations respectively centred on inward or outward focus. In inward organizations, emotions are more distinct and reciprocity is more based on physical distance (protection, loneliness); in outward organizations, emotions are more blurred and reciprocity is more based on a semantic sight of relations (approval, rules). Thanks to the modern technologies of neuroimaging (especially functional magnetic resonance, fIMR), a scientific, live study of what happens when an emotion starts is now possible. Method: We studied in 10 healthy subjects the amygdala and other nervous system structures activations when the subject perceives emotional expressions by seeing an unknown face and his/her own face. Results were also matched with inward/outward organization (studied with clinical approach and MMPI2, QSP, MQOP). Results and Discussion: Our results proved that an unknown face produces higher activation on the subjects than their own face (“surprise effect”); the anger mostly activates the right amygdala, while the joy activates both the amygdalas or the left one (it produces a semantic decoding). Outward subjects, with respect to the inward ones, respond to the anger with a less intense and univocal pattern, activate more cortical areas, not always respond to their own facial expressions and respond to the joy with an higher involvement of the left verbal hemisphere. Key words: Amygdala, emotions, fMRI, inward or outward personal meaning organizations.