Correlats neurals de la por a les ferides-sang: una comparació amb la por a les aranyes

Blood-injury fear/phobia produces a distinctive pattern of physiological response when compared to other kinds of fear/phobia. Whereas most fear/phobias are associated with a strong response of the Sympatic Nervous System, blood-injury fear/phobia is characterized by a parasympathetic response, known as the vasovagal syncope. Looking at symptoms, those different kinds of fear/phobia are located in opposite extremes of continuous arousal-fainting. Nowadays, several functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies have shown the involvement of limbic and paralimbic brain areas (specially the amygdala) in response of fear stimuli as could be spiders and snakes. The lack of fMRI studies involving blood-injury stimuli does not allow to know which brain areas would be involved in this kind of fear, and in the production of the vasovagal syncope. The present project aims to study by means of fMRIA techniques the physiological correlates of the emotional and physiological response to blood injury stimuli, and to fill this gap in the neurophysiological literature.