Our
baseline level of distrust is distinct and separable from our inborn lie
detector.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on my parahippocampal gyrus.
(May 18, 2015) Scientists
at the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute have found that suspicion
resides in two distinct regions of the brain: the amygdala, which plays a
central role in processing fear and emotional memories, and the parahippocampal
gyrus, which is associated with declarative memory and the recognition of
scenes.
“We
wondered how individuals assess the credibility of other people in simple
social interactions,” said Read Montague, director of the Human Neuroimaging Laboratory
and the Computational Psychiatry Unit at the Virginia Tech Carilion Research
Institute, who led the study. “We found a strong correlation between the
amygdala and a baseline level of distrust, which may be based on a person’s
beliefs about the trustworthiness of other people in general, his or her
emotional state, and the situation at hand. What surprised us, though, is that
when other people’s behavior aroused suspicion, the parahippocampal gyrus lit
up, acting like an inborn lie detector.”