A BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO THE NEUROGENETICS OF COGNITION-EMOTION INTERACTIONS

Curr Opin Behav Sci. 2018 Feb:19:50-54. doi: 10.1016/j.cobeha.2017.09.014. Epub 2017 Oct 15.

Abstract

Neuroscience research has demonstrated that cognition, emotion, and their dynamic interactions emerge from complex and flexible patterns of activity across distributed neural circuits. A parallel branch of research in genetics has begun to identify common variation in the human DNA sequence (i.e., genome) that may shape individual differences in cognition-emotion interactions by altering molecular and cellular pathways that modulate the activity of these neural circuits. Here we provide a brief introduction to such neurogenetics research and how it may usefully inform our understanding of the biological mechanisms through which dynamic cognition-emotion interactions emerge and, subsequently, help shape normal and abnormal behavior.