Your genes may influence how sensitive you are to emotional information

A new study has revealed that how your brain reacts to emotional information is influenced by your genes.

The University Of British Columbia study found that carriers of a certain genetic variation perceived positive and negative images more vividly and had heightened activity in certain brain regions.

Lead author Rebecca Todd said that people really do see the world differently, adding that for people with this gene variation, the emotionally relevant things in the world stand out much more.

The gene in question is ADRA2b, which influences the neurotransmitter norepinephrine. Todd's latest research is the first to use brain imaging to find out how the gene affects how vividly people perceive the world around them.

Todd added that they thought, from their previous research, that people with the deletion variant would probably show this emotionally enhanced vividness, and they did more than they would even have predicted.

Carriers of the gene variation showed significantly more activity in a region of the brain responsible for regulating emotions and evaluating both pleasure and threat. Todd believes this may help explain why some people are more susceptible to PTSD and intrusive memories following trauma.

Senior author Adam Anderson said that emotions are not only about how feel about the world, but how the brains influence our perception of it. As genes influence how people literally see the positive and negative aspects of the world more clearly, they may come to believe the world has more rewards or threats.

Todd points out that people who have the deletion variant are drawing on an additional network in their brains important for calculating the emotional relevance of things in the world. In any situation where noticing what's relevant in the environment is important, this gene variation would be a positive.

The study is published in The Journal of Neuroscience.