Essay On Amygdala

In the PTSD injured brain, the amygdala, the brain’s sentinel, has a privileged position in the perception due to its unique ability to see everything coming into the brain (Goleman, 2007). The amygdala is the alarm portion of the brain and will compare features from the environment trying to match past significant events relating to previous trauma. For Veteran’s with PTSD, this reaction starts with the perception of a situation that creates fear. When you have fear, the brain immediately goes to work sending the information on two different paths simultaneously. One path is extremely fast and is designed to react first and ask questions later. The other, much slower path takes its time analyzing the information and comparing it to things
The amygdala knows nothing about reasoning or cognitive functions; it deals with feelings and emotions. The problem that occurs is that the slower path, which takes a closer look at things and applies logic to the situation, is completely bypassed now. In a brain with the PTSD injury, there are no brakes to stop the reaction, and unfortunately the amygdala can be sloppy and distort things in making the quick judgments. It can take complete control of the brain at any time, and is powerful enough to shut down the prefrontal cortex because the amygdala’s only concern is survival. The amygdala can’t tell the difference in location and act accordingly, which can turn an ordinary “everyday” sound into a threat. The amygdala plays an important role in maintaining memories concerning emotional events, and becomes highly active during and while remembering a traumatic incident. However, the amygdala cannot tell the difference between a real and an imagined threat. So now, in regards to PTSD, the amygdala perceives everything as a threat or emergency, always in control, never at