The Role of the Cerebellum in Unconscious and Conscious Processing of Emotions: A Review

Abstract

Abstract:Studies from the past three decades have demonstrated that there is cerebellar involvement in the emotional domain. Emotional processing in humans requires both unconscious and conscious mechanisms. A significant amount of evidence indicates that the cerebellum is one of the cerebral structures that subserve emotional processing, although conflicting data has been reported on its function in unconscious and conscious mechanisms. This review discusses the available clinical, neuroimaging, and neurophysiological data on this issue. We also propose a model in which the cerebellum acts as a mediator between the internal state and external environment for the unconscious and conscious levels of emotional processing.

The Cerebellar Cognitive Affective/Schmahmann Syndrome: a Task Force Paper

“…In social/emotional cognition, patients with CB disorders show impairments in attributing facial expression to the correct emotional or mental state [106][107][108][109]; for a review, see [110]). With respect to understanding social behavior, several studies reported that CB patients have impairments in identifying or generating a plausible sequence of pictures reflecting a complex action performed by a human agent [111,112].…”

Implicit vs. Explicit Emotion Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorders: An Opinion on the Role of the Cerebellum

“…The contribution of the cerebellum to implicit and explicit mechanisms underlying emotion processing has been recently acknowledged (Clausi et al, 2017).…”

“…Indeed, the cerebellum is involved in implicit aspects such as the modulation of autonomic reactions, the automatic component of emotional learning associated, e.g., with fear conditioning (Critchley et al, 2000;Sacchetti et al, 2005;Timmann et al, 2010), and in the implicit processing of emotional facial expression (Schutter et al, 2009;Clausi et al, 2017). The cerebellar vermis might play a role in this stage of emotion elaboration through its connections with the brainstem (catecholamine neurons), the hypothalamus (Snider and Maiti, 1976), and the limbic areas, such as the amygdala and hippocampus (Sacchetti et al, 2005).…”

“…Instead, regarding the explicit aspects, the cerebellum is involved in the self-perception of negative emotions and in the integration of internal state information with external environmental stimuli to consciously and adaptively elaborate emotions (Timmann et al, 2010;Clausi et al, 2017Clausi et al, , 2019a.…”

Editorial: Sub- and Unconscious Information Processing in the Human Brain

“…Regardless of what "emotion"-definition one follows, it is fascinating to learn about the role of the cerebellum in unconscious and conscious processing of emotions [21]. The cerebellum is normally perceived as a rather basic structure supporting skillful behavior through integrating sensory and motor information.…”