The amygdala is a subcortical structure implicated in both the expression of conditioned fear and social fear recognition. Social fear recognition deficits following amygdala lesions are often interpreted as reflecting perceptual deficits, or the amygdala's role in coordinating responses to threats. But these explanations fail to capture why amygdala lesions impair both physiological and behavioural responses to multimodal fear cues and the ability to identify them. We hypothesized that social fear recognition deficits following amygdala damage reflect impaired conceptual understanding of fear. Supporting this prediction, we found specific impairments in the ability to predict others' fear (but not other emotions) from written scenarios following bilateral amygdala lesions. This finding is consistent with the suggestion that social fear recognition, much like social recognition of states like pain, relies on shared internal representations. Preserved judgements about the permissibility of causing others fear confirms suggestions that social emotion recognition and morality are dissociable.

中文翻译：

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双侧杏仁核损伤与预测他人恐惧的能力受损有关，但保留了引起他人恐惧的道德判断


杏仁核是一种皮层下结构，与条件性恐惧的表达和社会恐惧的识别有关。杏仁核损伤后的社交恐惧识别缺陷通常被解释为反映了知觉缺陷，或杏仁核在协调威胁反应中的作用。但这些解释未能解释为什么杏仁核损伤会损害对多模式恐惧线索的生理和行为反应以及识别它们的能力。我们假设杏仁核损伤后的社会恐惧识别缺陷反映了对恐惧的概念理解受损。支持这一预测的是，我们发现从双侧杏仁核损伤后的书面情景中预测他人恐惧（但不是其他情绪）的能力存在特定障碍。这一发现与以下观点一致：社会恐惧识别，就像社会对疼痛等状态的识别一样，依赖于共享的内部表征。对引起他人恐惧的允许性的保留判断证实了社会情感识别和道德是不可分离的这一观点。