81 research outputs found
Two systems for empathy: a double dissociation between emotional and cognitive empathy in inferior frontal gyrus versus ventromedial prefrontal lesions
Recent evidence suggests that there are two possible systems for empathy: a basic emotional contagion system and a more advanced cognitive perspective-taking system. However, it is not clear whether these two systems are part of a single interacting empathy system or whether they are independent. Additionally, the neuroanatomical bases of these systems are largely unknown. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that emotional empathic abilities (involving the mirror neuron system) are distinct from those related to cognitive empathy and that the two depend on separate anatomical substrates. Subjects with lesions in the ventromedial prefrontal (VM) or inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) cortices and two control groups were assessed with measures of empathy that incorporate both cognitive and affective dimensions. The findings reveal a remarkable behavioural and anatomic double dissociation between deficits in cognitive empathy (VM) and emotional empathy (IFG). Furthermore, precise anatomical mapping of lesions revealed Brodmann area 44 to be critical for emotional empathy while areas 11 and 10 were found necessary for cognitive empathy. These findings are consistent with these cortices being different in terms of synaptic hierarchy and phylogenetic age. The pattern of empathy deficits among patients with VM and IFG lesions represents a first direct evidence of a double dissociation between emotional and cognitive empathy using the lesion method. Keywords: Emotional empathy; cognitive empathy; mirror neurons; inferior frontal gyrus; ventromedial prefrontal cortex Abbreviations: ANOVA = analysis of variance; BA = Brodmann area; EC = empathic concern scale; FS = fantasy scale; HC = healthy control; IFG = inferior frontal gyrus; IRI = Interpersonal Reactivity Index; MNS = mirror neuron system; PC = posterior lesion; PD = personal distress scale; PT = perspective-taking scale; ToM = Theory of Mind; VM = ventromedial prefrontal; WCST = Wisconsin Card Sorting Test
ARE EMOTIONAL DISPLAYS AN EVOLUTIONARY PRECURSOR TO COMPOSITIONALITY IN LANGUAGE?
Compositionality is a basic property of language, spoken and signed, according
to which the meaning of a complex structure is determined by the meanings of
its constituents and the way they combine (e.g., Jackendoff, 2011 for spoken
language; Sandler 2012 for constituents conveyed by face and body signals in
sign language; Kirby & Smith, 2012 for emergence of compositionality). Here
we seek the foundations of this property in a more basic, and presumably prior,
form of communication: the spontaneous expression of emotion. To this end, we
ask whether features of facial expressions and body postures are combined and
recombined to convey different complex meanings in extreme displays of
emotions. There is evidence that facial expressions are processed in a
compositional fashion (Chen & Chen, 2010). In addition, facial components
such as nose wrinkles or eye opening elicit systematic confusion while decoding
facial expressions of disgust and anger and fear and surprise, respectively (Jack
et al., 2014), suggesting that other co-occurring signals contribute to their
interpretation. In spontaneous emotional displays of athletes, the body – and not
the face – better predicts participants’ correct assessments of victory and loss
pictures, as conveying positive or negative emotions (Aviezer et al., 2012),
suggesting at least that face and body make different contributions to
interpretations of the displays. Taken together, such studies lead to the
hypothesis that emotional displays are compositional - that each signal
component, or possibly specific clusters of components (Du et al., 2014), may
have their own interpretations, and make a contribution to the complex meaning
of the whole. On the assumption that emotional displays are older than language
in evolution, our research program aims to determine whether the crucial
property of compositionality is indeed present in communicative displays of
emotion
Cognitive and affective components of Theory of Mind in preschoolers with oppositional defiance disorder : clinical evidence
The goal of the study was to examine the affective-cognitive components of Theory of Mind (ToM), in a community sample of 538 preschoolers, and more specifically in a subsample of 40 children diagnosed with ODD. The relationship between affective and cognitive ToM and some ODD clinical characteristics was examined. Children were assessed with structured diagnostic interviews and dimensional measures of psychopathology, impairment and unemotional traits. A measure based on eye-gaze was used to assess ToM. Mixed analysis of variance compared the mean cognitive versus affective scale scores and the between-subjects factor ODD. The association between ToM-scores and clinical measures was assessed through correlation models. Execution and reaction time to emotional and cognitive components of ToM tasks are different at age 5 in normally developing children. Oppositional Defiant children had slower response time when performing the affective mentalizing condition than children without the disorder. The correlation matrix between ToM-scores and clinical measures showed specific associations depending on the impaired ToM aspect and the psychological domain. Results may have clinical implications for the prevention and management of OD
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The oxytocin receptor gene predicts brain activity during an emotion recognition task in autism.
BACKGROUND: Autism is a highly varied and heritable neurodevelopmental condition, and common variants explain approximately 50% of the genetic variance of autism. One of the genes implicated in autism is the oxytocin receptor (OXTR). The current study combined genetic and brain imaging (fMRI) data to examine the moderating effect of genotype on the association between diagnosis and brain activity in response to a test of cognitive empathy. METHODS: Participants were adolescents (mean age = 14.7 ± 1.7) who were genotyped for single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) within the OXTR and underwent functional brain imaging while completing the adolescent version of the 'Reading the Mind in the Eyes' Test (Eyes Test). RESULTS: Two (rs2254298, rs53576) of the five OXTR SNPs examined were significantly associated with brain activity during the Eyes Test, and three of the SNPs (rs2254298, rs53576, rs2268491) interacted with diagnostic status to predict brain activity. All of the effects localized to the right supramarginal gyrus (rSMG) and an overlap analysis revealed a large overlap of the effects. An exploratory analysis showed that activity within an anatomically defined rSMG and genotype can predict diagnostic status with reasonable accuracy. CONCLUSIONS: This is one of the first studies to investigate OXTR and brain function in autism. The findings suggest a neurogenetic mechanism by which OXTR-dependent activity within the rSMG is related to the aetiology of autism
Physiological Correlates of Volunteering
We review research on physiological correlates of volunteering, a neglected but promising research field. Some of these correlates seem to be causal factors influencing volunteering. Volunteers tend to have better physical health, both self-reported and expert-assessed, better mental health, and perform better on cognitive tasks. Research thus far has rarely examined neurological, neurochemical, hormonal, and genetic correlates of volunteering to any significant extent, especially controlling for other factors as potential confounds. Evolutionary theory and behavioral genetic research suggest the importance of such physiological factors in humans. Basically, many aspects of social relationships and social activities have effects on health (e.g., Newman and Roberts 2013; Uchino 2004), as the widely used biopsychosocial (BPS) model suggests (Institute of Medicine 2001). Studies of formal volunteering (FV), charitable giving, and altruistic behavior suggest that physiological characteristics are related to volunteering, including specific genes (such as oxytocin receptor [OXTR] genes, Arginine vasopressin receptor [AVPR] genes, dopamine D4 receptor [DRD4] genes, and 5-HTTLPR). We recommend that future research on physiological factors be extended to non-Western populations, focusing specifically on volunteering, and differentiating between different forms and types of volunteering and civic participation
Adaptive empathy: A model for learning empathic responses based on feedback
Empathy is usually deployed in social interactions. Nevertheless, common measures and examinations of empathy study this construct in isolation from the person in distress. In this paper we seek to extend the field of examination to include both empathizer and target in order to determine whether and how empathic responses are affected by feedback and learned through interaction. Building on computational approaches in feedback-based adaptations (e.g., no feedback, model-free and model-based learning), we propose a framework for understanding how empathic responses are learned based on feedback. In this framework, adaptive empathy, defined as the ability to adapt one’s empathic responses, is a central aspect of empathic skills, and can provide a new dimension to the evaluation and investigation of empathy. By extending existing neural models of empathy, we suggest that adaptive empathy may be mediated by interactions between the neural circuits associated with valuation, shared distress, observation-execution and mentalizing. Finally, we propose that adaptive empathy should be considered as a prominent facet of empathic capabilities with the potential to explain empathic behavior in health and in psychopathology
Affect labeling: The role of timing and intensity
A growing number of studies have shown that labeling negative feelings can down-regulate distress. The present study aimed to test the effectiveness of affect labeling while manipulating two factors known to influence the emotion regulation process, namely timing, and emotional intensity. In Experiment 1, sixty-three participants completed a performance-based affect labeling paradigm in which they had to choose between two labels that best describe their feeling. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three experimental conditions: (1) Simultaneous labeling- the labeling occurs while watching the aversive picture. (2) Subsequent labeling- the labeling occurs immediately after watching the aversive picture. (3) Delayed labeling- the labeling occurs 10 seconds after watching the aversive picture. We found that affect labeling efficiently down-regulated distress independent of the labeling timing. In Experiment 2, seventy-nine participants utilized simultaneous labeling for aversive pictures with low and high intensity. We revealed that while affect labeling reduces distress in high-intensity aversive conditions, it increases distress in low-intensity conditions. The results question the standard advice, which calls to count to 10 before you speak in highly aversive states. In addition, it suggests that affect labeling can be beneficial in high-intensity conditions. However, it should be used with caution in low-intensity conditions
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