Brief Report
Contribution of Ventrolateral Prefrontal Cortex to the Acquisition and Extinction of Conditioned Fear in Rats

https://doi.org/10.1006/nlme.1999.3907Get rights and content
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Abstract

The ventrolateral, agranular insular portion of prefrontal cortex (PFC) in rats is involved in visceral functions and has been shown to be involved in emotional processes. However, its contribution to aversive learning has not been well defined. Classical fear conditioning has been a powerful tool for illuminating some of the primary neural structures involved in aversive emotional learning. We measured both the acquisition and the extinction of conditioned fear following lesions of the ventrolateral PFC of rats. Lesions reduced fear reactivity to contextual stimuli associated with conditioning without affecting CS acquisition, and had no effect on response extinction. Ventrolateral PFC may normally be involved in the processing of contextual information while not being directly involved in extinction processes within the aversive domain.

Keywords

ventrolateral prefrontal cortex
fear conditioning
acquisition
extinction
context

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Address correspondence to Joseph E. LeDoux, Center for Neural Science, New York University, 4 Washington Place, 8th Floor, New York, NY 10003. E-mail: [email protected] or [email protected].