Resolving temporal threat uncertainty by observational learning involves the amygdala, hippocampus and anterior insula.

Overview

1. Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, 20246 Hamburg, Germany
2. Department of General Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience, Charlotte Fresenius University, 20148 Hamburg, Germany

Abstract

By observing others’ experiences, humans learn about threats while avoiding firsthand dangers. Yet, previous neuroscience research has focused on observational threats that are predictable. In firsthand learning, temporally predictable and unpredictable threats can be mechanistically discerned. In this study, we developed a novel observational paradigm in which participants learned from predictable and unpredictable observational threats, as well as a no-threat condition. Participants encountered the same conditions during an expression phase to investigate how the brain encodes predictive and unpredictive threat cues observed in others. Participants in Experiment 1 (n = 20, 14 female, 6 male) and Experiment 2 (n = 23, 9 female, 1 non-binary, 13 male) successfully learned threat contingencies, showing heightened threat expectations for predictive cues and unpredictable condition-onsets. Behavioral findings converged with neural (fMRI, Experiment 2) responses in the anterior insula during the expression phase. Reflecting the dynamic process of learning, amygdala activation in response to predictive threat cues displayed a linear decrease across trials. Interestingly, BOLD responses to others’ pain that was predictable, were enhanced within the amygdala, insula and hippocampus, compared to unpredictable conditions. Our findings suggest that humans can learn to resolve temporal threat uncertainty, through the observation of others. The present work thereby contributes to understanding the social aspects of fear and anxiety disorders.

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Data availability

Raw behavioral data from both experiments and code from the fMRI analysis is available in this online repository: https://osf.io/653pr/. Wholebrain t-maps for all reported contrasts can be found in a neurovault online repository: https://identifiers.org/neurovault.collection:23814.

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

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Version 1, 28 September 2026: the first record

Recorded: type, language, journal, volume, issue, pages, dates, 7 authors, 2 keywords, 14 MeSH terms, 1 funder, 45 references, 7 RRIDs.

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This paper

Knobloch, S., Jansen, T., Hille, L. C., Müller, M., Rumpf, L., Bauer, C. F. L., & Haaker, J. (2026). Resolving temporal threat uncertainty by observational learning involves the amygdala, hippocampus and anterior insula. Translational psychiatry, 16(1), 488. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41398-026-04492-7

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