Of impulsions and emotions

If it’s not always easy to control or more so to manage our emotions, it’s because it is a recent function of the human brain, so to speak.

It is only fairly recently that we, humans, have been able to somewhat manage our emotions.

An interesting experience was conducted at the Institute of Sciences and Behavior, in the Netherlands. Researchers temporarily deactivated the prefrontal cortex in healthy volunteers. We then studied how they were able to control their impulsions.

What we did know, even before this experimentation, was that the prefrontal cortex was the part of the brain that appeared most recently, in terms of human evolution. It was already recognized that this part of the brain was responsible for management of our impulsions.

Via transcranial magnetic stimulation, we were able to deactivate the prefrontal cortex. When asked to perform a specific task, the subjects whose prefrontal cortex was deactivated were not able to control their impulsions as well as the ones that had access to it.

To make matters worse, it was examined that subjects whose prefrontal cortex was deactivated showed an increase in activation of the amygdala. The amygdala manages fear, for example. This allows us to think that one of the roles of the prefrontal cortex is attenuation of the fear response.

Posturology can help in the sense whereby it promotes muscle balance. It is information from the muscle sense that turns on the prefrontal cortex. It goes without saying that to be physically balanced helps in being balanced… in your head!