What is the function of the amygdala? How does its function relate to stress and memories?

What will be an ideal response?

The amygdala of the cerebral hemispheres however is important to our understanding of our physiological and emotional responses to stress. It is part of the limbic system that will be discussed later and is made of about 10 nuclei that are involved in mediating emotional responses, particularly fear and anxiety. How do we know this? We know this because people who have had their amygdala electrically stimulated report these emotional states. It is also involved in the social recognition of the fear state in the faces of others. Lesions of this area due to disease impair this emotion recognition ability. The amygdala also seems to participate in the process of storing memories about which stimuli should be approached and which to avoid. It seems to be involved in assessing threat stimuli and in emotional memory formation. Further, the amygdala participates in the process of classically conditioned fear responses where we learn to associate particular stimuli with fear or anxiety.