The Cognitive Neuroscience of Fear Learning
Fear learning provides organisms with the ability to use signals from their environment to predict potential danger and to recruit defensive behavior. Fear conditioning has long been studied as a model of fear learning in animals and, with the advent of functional brain imaging, has proven critical in translating the neurocircuitry underlying fear learning in animals to humans. This chapter provides an overview of the cognitive neuroscience of fear learning by focusing on key findings from animal and human work that shed light on how fears are acquired and subsequently diminished. Recent advances that highlight the flexibility of the fear learning system are also discussed, focusing on how contexts influence learning and extinction, how fear is generalized beyond initial learning, and the neural mechanisms that make it possible to acquire fear from others without direct experience. Finally, future directions for the field, focusing on variation at the genetic and individual levels, are presented.
