Emozioni e cervello: aspetti psicobiologici

The emotional system is one of the oldest and deepest parts of the brain. Indeed, feeling appears when you become aware of what your brain has evaluated as an emotional reaction.
Activation of the emotional system is mediated by the sensory processes through the interaction with environment. The complex interaction between individual and environment, as well as the brain development are essentially regulated by genetics and influenced by epigenetics, from receptive (and enteroceptive) sensory systems. The emotional behavior is thus based on received and processed informations.
Cytoarchitecture and functional structure of the brain – as increasingly analyzed and known by brain imaging technology - hide what happened as phylogenetic and ontogenetic evolution. The evolutionary history of the brain is confirmed by the demonstration that the phylogenetically older areas of brain mature earlier than all the other ones.
The emotional areas are among the oldest and appear to be, especially those represented in the right hemisphere, the supporting structures of the nervous and mental system. Assuming that learning changes thoughts, feelings, and memories, and life is a continuous process of acquisition, it may be assumed that the structures of the brain, during growth and aging, also change in response to our reaction to choices and obligations, freedoms and constraints.
The brain is an inherently plastic and dynamic structure that develops itself on the basis of the adjustment. Each individual brain is unique in terms of structure, function, skill, including sprouting, neurogenesis, mirror neurons and embodied simulation. Brain is a relational organ rather then an isolated part of the body. Its capability to adaptation and resilience continuously changes in relation to what is happening in the body and in the interaction with the environment.
Studies on the psychobiological mechanisms of the brain, especially those of the emotional brain, will clarify and understand how brain structures change in according to the experiences.