C. Banzhaf et al. Interacting and dissociable effects of alexithymia and depression on empathy 1 ... more C. Banzhaf et al. Interacting and dissociable effects of alexithymia and depression on empathy 1 Highlights Empathy deficits in participants with high alexithymia regarding cognitive empathy. Particularly high personal distress in depression when affected by alexithymia. Alexithymia seems to affect empathy at nearly all levels. Empathy deficits in depression can mostly be attributed to concurrent alexithymia.
Training the capacity to self-generate emotions can be a potent "vaccine" against negative stress... more Training the capacity to self-generate emotions can be a potent "vaccine" against negative stressors and be an effective intervention for affective psychopathology. However, due to a lack of knowledge about sources of individual differences in generation abilities, it is unclear how to optimally design such interventions. We investigated one potential source of variation, namely preference for using different information modalities (Visual Imagery, Auditory Imagery, Bodily Interoception, and Semantic Analysis). A representative sample of 293 participants self-induced positive and negative emotional states, freely choosing to use these modalities singly or in combination. No evidence was found for modality usage being associated with differential efficacy at generating of positive or negative emotion. Rather, usage of all modalities (except Auditory Imagery) predicted success at generation of both positive and negative emotional states. Increasing age predicted capacity to generate, especially negative, emotions. While no specific combinations of modalities were superior, the overall degree to which participants adopted multimodal implementations did predict generation efficacy. These findings inform interventions aimed at improving emotional self-generation, suggesting these must be mindful of individual differences in generation abilities and implementation tendencies, and that they should focus on enhancing the capacity to use multiple modalities.
Emotions are frequently thought of as reactions to events in the world. However, many of our emot... more Emotions are frequently thought of as reactions to events in the world. However, many of our emotional experiences are of our own making, coming from thoughts and memories. These different origins mean that these endogenous emotions are more controllable than exogenous emotions, making plausible a role of endogenous emotion in self-regulation and mental health. We tested this idea in a representative sample of 277 individuals (163 female, 20-55 years) who partook in an experiment measuring individual differences in endogenous emotion generation ability and a questionnaire battery measuring individual differences in trait affect and emotional self-regulation style. Two hypotheses for how endogenous emotion generation can facilitate mental health were tested: By buffering negative stressors with selfgenerated positive emotion enabling use of emotion-focused regulation techniques, or by allowing effective simulation of the emotional consequences of future events, facilitating active and instrumental coping. Support for both hypotheses was found. Consistent with buffering, positive emotion generation ability mediated the relationship between emotion-focused regulation and trait affect, while the ability to generate emotions regardless of valence, was found to mediate the relationship between active and instrumental regulation and trait affect, supporting a simulation account. This suggests role of emotion generation in emotion regulation, a finding of both theoretical and practical implication for mental health interventions. There are more things likely to frighten us than there are to crush us; we suffer more often in imagination than in reality.-Seneca
Social skills such as our abilities to understand feelings and thoughts are at the core of what m... more Social skills such as our abilities to understand feelings and thoughts are at the core of what makes us human. Here, we combined a unique longitudinal intervention study with cuttingedge connectomics to study the organization and plasticity of brain networks associated with different social skills (socio-affective, socio-cognitive, and attention-mindfulness). Baseline analysis in our cohort (n=332) showed that social brain networks have (i) compact and dissociable signatures in a low-dimensional manifold governed by gradients of brain connectivity, (ii) specific neurobiological underpinnings, and (iii) reflect inter-individual variations in social behavior. Furthermore, longitudinal brain network analyses following a 9month training intervention indicated (iv) domain-specific reorganization of these signatures that was furthermore predictive of behavioral change in social functions. Multiple sensitivity analyses supported robustness. Our findings, thus, provide novel evidence on macroscale network organization and plasticity underlying human social cognition and behavior, and suggest connectome-reconfigurations as a mechanism of adult skill learning.
Affektive (Empathie und Mitgefühl) und kognitive (Theory of Mind (ToM)) neuronale Netzwerke liege... more Affektive (Empathie und Mitgefühl) und kognitive (Theory of Mind (ToM)) neuronale Netzwerke liegen unserem Verständnis Anderer zugrunde. Inwieweit diese Netzwerke direkt trennbar sind, ob sie einander bedingen, d.h. ob hohe Empathie-Fähigkeit auch gute ToM-Fertigkeiten bedeutet, und wie sie zusammenarbeiten ist unbekannt. Im Rahmen der ReSource-Studie, einer 9-Monats-Trainings-Studie mit Modulen zu Achtsamkeit, Affekt und Perspektivübernahme sind wir sowohl diesen Fragen, als auch der differentiellen Plastizität der Netzwerke nachgegangen. Die neu-entwickelte Aufgabe ‚EmpaToM‘ konfrontiert Probanden (N=178) im fMRT mit naturalistischen Videos in denen emotionale oder neutrale Episoden berichtet werden. Auf jedes Video folgt eine Frage zum Inhalt des Videos, die entweder ToM oder logisches Schlussfolgern testet. Die Ergebnisse zeigen klare Trennbarkeit der Netzwerke, die während des Online-Verständnisses Anderer miteinander kommunizieren. Hohe Empathie-Fähigkeit geht dabei nicht automatisch mit guten ToM-Fertigkeiten einher. Besonders bedeutsam für die Psychotherapieforschung sind differentielle Effekte der verschiedenen Module, die zeigen, dass sozio-affektive und -kognitive Fähigkeiten separat trainiert werden können
Mindfulness-and, more generally, meditation-based interventions increasingly gain popularity, eff... more Mindfulness-and, more generally, meditation-based interventions increasingly gain popularity, effectively promoting cognitive, affective, and social capacities. It is unclear, however, if different types of practice have the same or specific effects on mental functioning. Here we tested three consecutive three-month training modules aimed at cultivating either attention, socio-affective qualities (such as compassion), or socio-cognitive skills (such as theory of mind), in three training cohorts and a retest control cohort (N = 332). While attentional performance improved most consistently after attention training, compassion increased most after socio-affective training and theory of mind partially improved after socio-cognitive training. These results show that specific mental training practices are needed to induce plasticity in different domains of mental functioning, providing a foundation for evidence-based development of more targeted interventions adapted to the needs of different education, labor, and health settings.
Functional neuroimaging studies have suggested the existence of 2 largely distinct social cogniti... more Functional neuroimaging studies have suggested the existence of 2 largely distinct social cognition networks, one for theory of mind (taking others' cognitive perspective) and another for empathy (sharing others' affective states). To address whether these networks can also be dissociated at the level of brain structure, we combined behavioral phenotyping across multiple socio-cognitive tasks with 3-Tesla MRI cortical thickness and structural covariance analysis in 270 healthy adults, recruited across 2 sites. Regional thickness mapping only provided partial support for divergent substrates, highlighting that individual differences in empathy relate to left insular-opercular thickness while no correlation between thickness and mentalizing scores was found. Conversely, structural covariance analysis showed clearly divergent network modulations by socio-cognitive and-affective phenotypes. Specifically, individual differences in theory of mind related to structural integration between temporo-parietal and dorsomedial prefrontal regions while empathy modulated the strength of dorsal anterior insula networks. Findings were robust across both recruitment sites, suggesting generalizability. At the level of structural network embedding, our study provides a double dissociation between empathy and mentalizing. Moreover, our findings suggest that structural substrates of higher-order social cognition are reflected rather in interregional networks than in the the local anatomical markup of specific regions per se.
Meditation-based mental training interventions show great benefits for physical and mental health... more Meditation-based mental training interventions show great benefits for physical and mental health. However, it remains unclear how different types of mental practice differentially affect emotion processing at both the neuronal and the behavioural level. In the context of the ReSource project, 332 participants underwent an fMRI scan while performing an emotion reactivity task before and after three 3-month training modules cultivating 1) attention and interoceptive awareness (Presence); 2) socio-affective skills, such as compassion (Affect); 3) socio-cognitive skills, such as theory of mind (Perspective). Only the Affect module led to a significant reduction of experienced negative affect when processing images depicting human suffering. This decrease in emotion reactivity was associated with increased activation in cognitive control and emotion-regulation regions such as lateral parietal and prefrontal brain regions. We conclude that socio-affective, but not attention-or meta-cognitive based mental training is specifically efficient to improve emotion regulation capacities when facing adversity.
Social neuroscience has identified different neural networks, a more affective (empathy and compa... more Social neuroscience has identified different neural networks, a more affective (empathy and compassion) and a more cognitive route (Theory of Mind (ToM)) to the understanding of others. While the anterior insula (AI) is critically involved when empathizing with the pain of another person, experiencing compassion for another’s suffering activates a different network including the ventral striatum. ToM tasks, in contrast, engage the temporoparietal junction (TPJ), temporal poles (TP) and medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). To study the separability and interrelations of these neural networks as well as their plasticity, we developed a novel paradigm, the EmpaToM. In the EmpaToM task, participants were presented with naturalistic video stimuli in which people recount autobiographical episodes that are either emotional or neutral. Each video is followed by empathy and compassion ratings and questions about the content of the video that probe ToM. Participants were tested before and after each training module in a 3T Scanner. At baseline, emotional vs. neutral videos increased activity in bilateral AI, which parametrically modulated with subjective empathy ratings. Compassion ratings, in contrast, covaried with activity in the ventral striatum. ToM activated bilateral TPJ, TP and MPFC. Inter-individual differences in the activity of these networks were uncorrelated, suggesting independence of these socio-affective and -cognitive abilities. Training in the Perspective, but not the Presence or Affective Module, enhanced performance in ToM questions. The compassion ratings, in contrast, increased more after the Affective and Perspective module, not so however after the Presence module. Similarly, differential change was also observed with regards to the neural networks underlying compassion and ToM. The present results confirm that the neural networks underlying empathy, compassion and ToM can be reliably identified within a single task and also demonstrate their independence on an inter-individual level – strong empathizers are not (necessarily) good mentalizers. Most critically, the training-related changes indicate that Theory of Mind can be trained by specific practices implemented in the Perspective Module. Surprisingly, there was an increase in experienced compassion after both, the Affective and the Perspective Modules. As no effect was observed after the Presence Module, which focused on attention and interoceptive awareness, the readiness to experience compassion seems to only increase after modules involving intersubjective exercises focusing on prosocial affect and motivation (Affective) or cognitive perspective taking of self and others (Perspective). In conclusion, these results provide first evidence that we can induce plasticity in socio-affective and socio-cognitive capacities through specifically designed mental training programs
Introduction: The ability to understand other people's mind and feelings encompasses differen... more Introduction: The ability to understand other people's mind and feelings encompasses different abilities such as empathy, the ability to share affective states of others, and mentalizing, the ability to attribute mental states to others. Functional neuroimaging has identified distinct substrates of both empathy and mentalizing. While for example empathizing with the pain or suffering of others consistently involves dorsal anterior insula cortex (dAI), inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), and anterior midcingulate cortex (aMCC), mentalizing relates to activity in a network including dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC), posterior temporo-parietal junction (pTPJ), and superior temporal gyrus/sulcus (STG/STS). Whether this divergence is also found at the level of brain structure is unknown. Here, we employ MRI covariance analysis to jointly assess structural network substrates of individual differences in empathy and mentalizing. Methods: We studied 154 healthy participants (94 women, mean±SD age=40.5±9.5 years). We aggregated measures derived from multiple tasks (Samson et al., 2010; Klimecki et al., 2013; Kanske et al., in press) to create constructs of empathy and mentalizing. T1-weighted MRI was obtained using a 3T Siemens Verio scanner. FreeSurfer was used of generate cortical surface models and to measure cortical thickness (Fischl and Dale, 2000). Analysis was performed using SurfStat (Worsley et al., 2009). Based on intersections of task-based functional activations in the same subjects (Kanske et al., in press) and meta-analytical results (Lamm et al., 2011; Mar, 2011), we defined seeds involved in empathy (dAI, aMCC, IFG) and mentalizing pTPJ, STG/STS). We furthermore studied the right supramarginal gyrus (rSMG), a region proximal to the pTPJ that has been suggested to play a role in affective perspective taking (Silani et al., 2013). To map structural covariance networks, we correlated thickness of each seed with thickness across the entire cortical mantle. We studied the interaction between seed covariance strength and individual differences in empathy and mentalizing. Findings were corrected for multiple comparisons using random field theory. Results: We observed that individual differences in empathy and mentalizing related to the covariance of non-overlapping networks. Specifically, individuals with high empathy score had increased right dAI covariance to lateral prefrontal regions, whereas importantly, covariance of TPJ, dmPFC, STG/STS were not modulated by individual differences in empathy (Figure 1). On the other hand, individuals scoring high on mentalizing capacity had increased pTPJ and STG/STS network covariance to mPFC and TPJ (Figure 2). And again, no modulation of dAI, aMCC and IFG was observed by individual differences in mentalizing scores. Interestingly and in line with previous work, rSMG was modulated by empathy, but not mentalizing, to regions similar to the covariance network found in right dAI (Figure 3)
Social neuroscience has identified different neural networks, a more affective (empathy and compa... more Social neuroscience has identified different neural networks, a more affective (empathy and compassion) and a more cognitive route (Theory of Mind (ToM)), to the understanding of others. While the anterior insula (AI) is critically involved when empathizing with the pain of another person, experiencing compassion for another’s suffering activates a different network including the ventral striatum. ToM tasks, in contrast, engage the temporoparietal junction (TPJ), temporal poles (TP) and medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). The separability and interrelations of these two capacities and their related neural networks is, however, little understood. We, therefore, developed a novel task, the EmpaToM. Participants are presented with naturalistic video stimuli in which people recount autobiographical episodes that are either emotional or neutral. Each video is followed by empathy and compassion ratings and questions about the content of the video that probe ToM. Emotional vs. neutral videos increased activity in bilateral AI, which parametrically modulated with subjective empathy ratings. Compassion ratings, in contrast, covaried with activity in the ventral striatum. ToM activated bilateral TPJ, TP and MPFC. These two networks interact during the online understanding of others. However, inter-individual differences in the activity of these networks were uncorrelated, suggesting some independence, such that strong empathizers are not (necessarily) good mentalizers. Separate training of these capacities within the longitudinal ReSource study has differential enhancing effects on ToM performance and compassion, providing some first evidence that we can induce plasticity in socio-affective and socio-cognitive capacities
This is a PDF file of an article that has undergone enhancements after acceptance, such as the ad... more This is a PDF file of an article that has undergone enhancements after acceptance, such as the addition of a cover page and metadata, and formatting for readability, but it is not yet the definitive version of record. This version will undergo additional copyediting, typesetting and review before it is published in its final form, but we are providing this version to give early visibility of the article. Please note that, during the production process, errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain.
A classical model of human attention holds that independent neural networks realize stimulus-driv... more A classical model of human attention holds that independent neural networks realize stimulus-driven reorienting and executive control of attention. Questioning full independence, the two functions do, however, engage overlapping networks with activations in cingulo-opercular regions such as anterior insula (AI) and a reverse pattern of activation (stimulusdriven reorienting), and deactivation (executive control) in temporoparietal junction (TPJ). To test for independent versus shared neural mechanisms underlying stimulus-driven and executive control of attention, we used fMRI and a task that isolates individual from concurrent demands in both functions. Results revealed super-additive increases of left AI activity and behavioral response costs under concurrent demands, suggesting a common bottleneck for stimulus-driven reorienting and executive control of attention. These increases were mirrored by non-additive decreases of activity in the default mode network (DMN), including posterior TPJ, regions where activity increased with off-task processes. The deactivations in posterior TPJ were spatially separated from stimulus-driven reorienting related activation in anterior TPJ, a differentiation that replicated in task-free resting state. Furthermore, functional connectivity indicated inhibitory coupling between posterior TPJ and AI during concurrent attention demands. These results demonstrate a role of AI in stimulus-driven and executive control of attention that involves down-regulation of internally directed processes in DMN.
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, Jul 21, 2016
One important aspect of metacognition is the ability to accurately evaluate one's performance. Pe... more One important aspect of metacognition is the ability to accurately evaluate one's performance. People vary widely in their metacognitive ability and in general are too confident when evaluating their performance. This often leads to poor decision making with potentially disastrous consequences. To further our understanding of the neural underpinnings of these processes, this fMRI study investigated inter-individual differences in metacognitive ability and effects of trial-by-trial variation in subjective feelings of confidence when making metacognitive assessments. Participants (N ¼ 308) evaluated their performance in a high-level social and cognitive reasoning task. The results showed that higher metacognitive accuracy was associated with a decrease in activation in the anterior medial prefrontal cortex, an area previously linked to metacognition on perception and memory. Moreover, the feeling of confidence about one's choices was associated with an increase of activation in reward, memory and motor related areas including bilateral striatum and hippocampus, while less confidence was associated with activation in areas linked with negative affect and uncertainty, including dorsomedial prefrontal and bilateral orbitofrontal cortex. This might indicate that positive affect is related to higher confidence thereby biasing metacognitive decisions towards overconfidence. In support, behavioural analyses revealed that increased confidence was associated with lower metacognitive accuracy.
Although neuroscientific research has revealed experience-dependent brain changes across the life... more Although neuroscientific research has revealed experience-dependent brain changes across the life span in sensory, motor, and cognitive domains, plasticity relating to social capacities remains largely unknown. To investigate whether the targeted mental training of different cognitive and social skills can induce specific changes in brain morphology, we collected longitudinal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data throughout a 9-month mental training intervention from a large sample of adults between 20 and 55 years of age. By means of various daily mental exercises and weekly instructed group sessions, training protocols specifically addressed three functional domains: (i) mindfulness-based attention and interoception, (ii) socio-affective skills (compassion, dealing with difficult emotions, and prosocial motivation), and (iii) socio-cognitive skills (cognitive perspective-taking on self and others and metacognition). MRIbased cortical thickness analyses, contrasting the different training modules against each other, indicated spatially diverging changes in cortical morphology. Training of present-moment focused attention mostly led to increases in cortical thickness in prefrontal regions, socio-affective training induced plasticity in frontoinsular regions, and sociocognitive training included change in inferior frontal and lateral temporal cortices. Module-specific structural brain changes correlated with training-induced behavioral improvements in the same individuals in domain-specific measures of attention, compassion, and cognitive perspective-taking, respectively, and overlapped with task-relevant functional networks. Our longitudinal findings indicate structural plasticity in well-known socio-affective and socio-cognitive brain networks in healthy adults based on targeted short daily mental practices. These findings could promote the development of evidence-based mental training interventions in clinical, educational, and corporate settings aimed at cultivating social intelligence, prosocial motivation, and cooperation.
Training the capacity to self-generate emotions can be a potent "vaccine" against negative stress... more Training the capacity to self-generate emotions can be a potent "vaccine" against negative stressors and be an effective intervention for affective psychopathology. However, due to a lack of knowledge about sources of individual differences in generation abilities, it is unclear how to optimally design such interventions. We investigated one potential source of variation, namely preference for using different information modalities (Visual Imagery, Auditory Imagery, Bodily Interoception, and Semantic Analysis). A representative sample of 293 participants self-induced positive and negative emotional states, freely choosing to use these modalities singly or in combination. No evidence was found for modality usage being associated with differential efficacy at generating of positive or negative emotion. Rather, usage of all modalities (except Auditory Imagery) predicted success at generation of both positive and negative emotional states. Increasing age predicted capacity to generate, especially negative, emotions. While no specific combinations of modalities were superior, the overall degree to which participants adopted multimodal implementations did predict generation efficacy. These findings inform interventions aimed at improving emotional self-generation, suggesting these must be mindful of individual differences in generation abilities and implementation tendencies, and that they should focus on enhancing the capacity to use multiple modalities.
The emotional matching paradigm, introduced by Hariri and colleagues in 2000, is a widely used ne... more The emotional matching paradigm, introduced by Hariri and colleagues in 2000, is a widely used neuroimaging experiment that reliably activates the amygdala. In the classic version of the experiment faces with negative emotional expression and scenes depicting distressing events are compared with geometric shapes instead of neutral stimuli of the same category (i.e. faces or scenes). This makes it difficult to clearly attribute amygdala activation to the emotional valence and not to the social content. To improve this paradigm, we conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging study in which emotionally neutral and, additionally, positive stimuli within each stimulus category (i.e. faces, social and non-social scenes) were included. These categories enabled us to differentiate the exact nature of observed effects in the amygdala. First, the main findings of the original paradigm were replicated. Second, we observed amygdala activation when comparing negative to neutral stimuli of the same category. However, for negative faces, the amygdala response habituated rapidly. Third, positive stimuli were associated with widespread activation including the insula and the caudate. This validated adaption study enables more precise statements on the neural activation underlying emotional processing. These advances may benefit future studies on identifying selective impairments in emotional and social stimulus processing. Amygdala functioning is of high interest for clinical psychology, psychiatry and neuroscience, as heightened amygdala activation has been reported in various patient groups 1-5. The emotional matching paradigm by Hariri et al. 6 and its extended version 7 are widely used as emotional reactivity measures, which reliably activate the amygdala 8-10. Despite its current use in psychiatry, this paradigm has a potential drawback since faces with negative emotional expressions and negative social scenes are compared with simple geometric shapes. Thus, it compares pictures that differ in more than one domain: social content and emotional valence. It is therefore difficult to draw conclusions about which of the two different domains causes the increase in amygdala activation. This differentiation may arguably not be relevant for all purposes, but to study specific populations, such as patients with deficits in one or the other domain (e.g. those with autism spectrum disorder (ASD)) 11,12 , it is crucial to distinguish the two. A second issue is that negative emotions have been studied more widely than positive emotions, as exemplified by the original emotional matching paradigm, putatively due to their high functional value for action. For example previous research suggests that threatening scenes, whether they contained faces or no human features, elicited activation in the extrastriate body area, suggesting that this activity to threatening scenes, represents the capacity of the brain to associate certain situations with threat, in order to prepare for fast reactions 13. Positive emotions are, however, the other side of the coin, as they allow psychological growth and well-being 14. Positive stimuli are most commonly used in the context of reward experiments, for example in performance-based feedback tasks 15,16. A brain region that has been related to the processing of various reward types, ranging from primary reinforcers to more abstract social rewards 17,18 , is the ventral striatum 19. Also, meta-analytically, the ventral striatum elicits the strongest activation across the different reward types such as monetary, food and erotic rewards 20. The amygdala was also found to be activated in response to positive stimuli. For direct comparisons of positive and negative faces, not all studies found amygdala activation differences 21 , but a meta-analysis of
Successful social interactions require both affect sharing (empathy) and understanding others' me... more Successful social interactions require both affect sharing (empathy) and understanding others' mental states (Theory of Mind, ToM). As these two functions have mostly been investigated in isolation, the specificity of the underlying neural networks and the relation of these networks to the respective behavioral indices could not be tested. Here, we present a novel fMRI paradigm (EmpaToM) that independently manipulates both empathy and ToM. Experiments 1a/b (N = 90) validated the task with established empathy and ToM paradigms on a behavioral and neural level. Experiment 2 (N = 178) employed the EmpaToM and revealed clearly separable neural networks including anterior insula for empathy and ventral temporoparietal junction for ToM. These distinct networks could be replicated in task-free resting state functional connectivity. Importantly, brain activity in these two networks specifically predicted the respective behavioral indices, that is, inter-individual differences in ToM related brain activity predicted inter-individual differences in ToM performance, but not empathic responding, and vice versa. Taken together, the validated EmpaToM allows separation of affective and cognitive routes to understanding others. It may thus benefit future clinical, developmental, and intervention studies on identifying selective impairments and improvement in specific components of social cognition.
The neural networks associated with socio-affective (empathy, compassion) and socio-cognitive pro... more The neural networks associated with socio-affective (empathy, compassion) and socio-cognitive processes (mentalizing/Theory of Mind) have been well-characterized over the last years. The goal of the present talk is twofold: (1) To explore the separability of these functions during online social understanding on a subjective, behavioral and on a neural level and (2) to investigate the embedding of the related neural substrates in large-scale task-free neural networks. To this end, we acquired resting state as well as behavioral and neuroimaging data (fMRI) during a social video task in a large sample of participants (N = 178). The videos were short autobiographical narrations of emotionally negative and neutral events that allowed for asking Theory of Mind questions about the thoughts of the narrators and factual reasoning questions about the content of the stories, thereby allowing for independent assessment of socio-affective and socio-cognitive processing. Linking the phenomenological with the neural level, participants reported increased negative affect after emotional stories, which covaried with activity strength in the meta-analytically defined “empathy network”, but not with activity in the “Theory of Mind network”. Vice versa, performance in answering the Theory of Mind questions correlated with “Theory of Mind network”, but not “empathy network” activity. Interestingly, neither behavioral markers of social affect and mentalizing (i.e. emotional valence ratings and Theory of Mind performance) nor activity in the two respective neural networks correlated with each other. Furthermore, resting state functional connectivity to task activation based seed regions for empathy and Theory of Mind yielded distinct networks that strongly overlapped with the respective task activations and correspond to the well-described default mode network (Theory of Mind seeds) and the salience or central executive network (empathy). The data strongly argue for dissociable and independent socio-affective and -cognitive functions that are embedded in large-scale task-unrelated neural circuits
C. Banzhaf et al. Interacting and dissociable effects of alexithymia and depression on empathy 1 ... more C. Banzhaf et al. Interacting and dissociable effects of alexithymia and depression on empathy 1 Highlights Empathy deficits in participants with high alexithymia regarding cognitive empathy. Particularly high personal distress in depression when affected by alexithymia. Alexithymia seems to affect empathy at nearly all levels. Empathy deficits in depression can mostly be attributed to concurrent alexithymia.
Training the capacity to self-generate emotions can be a potent "vaccine" against negative stress... more Training the capacity to self-generate emotions can be a potent "vaccine" against negative stressors and be an effective intervention for affective psychopathology. However, due to a lack of knowledge about sources of individual differences in generation abilities, it is unclear how to optimally design such interventions. We investigated one potential source of variation, namely preference for using different information modalities (Visual Imagery, Auditory Imagery, Bodily Interoception, and Semantic Analysis). A representative sample of 293 participants self-induced positive and negative emotional states, freely choosing to use these modalities singly or in combination. No evidence was found for modality usage being associated with differential efficacy at generating of positive or negative emotion. Rather, usage of all modalities (except Auditory Imagery) predicted success at generation of both positive and negative emotional states. Increasing age predicted capacity to generate, especially negative, emotions. While no specific combinations of modalities were superior, the overall degree to which participants adopted multimodal implementations did predict generation efficacy. These findings inform interventions aimed at improving emotional self-generation, suggesting these must be mindful of individual differences in generation abilities and implementation tendencies, and that they should focus on enhancing the capacity to use multiple modalities.
Emotions are frequently thought of as reactions to events in the world. However, many of our emot... more Emotions are frequently thought of as reactions to events in the world. However, many of our emotional experiences are of our own making, coming from thoughts and memories. These different origins mean that these endogenous emotions are more controllable than exogenous emotions, making plausible a role of endogenous emotion in self-regulation and mental health. We tested this idea in a representative sample of 277 individuals (163 female, 20-55 years) who partook in an experiment measuring individual differences in endogenous emotion generation ability and a questionnaire battery measuring individual differences in trait affect and emotional self-regulation style. Two hypotheses for how endogenous emotion generation can facilitate mental health were tested: By buffering negative stressors with selfgenerated positive emotion enabling use of emotion-focused regulation techniques, or by allowing effective simulation of the emotional consequences of future events, facilitating active and instrumental coping. Support for both hypotheses was found. Consistent with buffering, positive emotion generation ability mediated the relationship between emotion-focused regulation and trait affect, while the ability to generate emotions regardless of valence, was found to mediate the relationship between active and instrumental regulation and trait affect, supporting a simulation account. This suggests role of emotion generation in emotion regulation, a finding of both theoretical and practical implication for mental health interventions. There are more things likely to frighten us than there are to crush us; we suffer more often in imagination than in reality.-Seneca
Social skills such as our abilities to understand feelings and thoughts are at the core of what m... more Social skills such as our abilities to understand feelings and thoughts are at the core of what makes us human. Here, we combined a unique longitudinal intervention study with cuttingedge connectomics to study the organization and plasticity of brain networks associated with different social skills (socio-affective, socio-cognitive, and attention-mindfulness). Baseline analysis in our cohort (n=332) showed that social brain networks have (i) compact and dissociable signatures in a low-dimensional manifold governed by gradients of brain connectivity, (ii) specific neurobiological underpinnings, and (iii) reflect inter-individual variations in social behavior. Furthermore, longitudinal brain network analyses following a 9month training intervention indicated (iv) domain-specific reorganization of these signatures that was furthermore predictive of behavioral change in social functions. Multiple sensitivity analyses supported robustness. Our findings, thus, provide novel evidence on macroscale network organization and plasticity underlying human social cognition and behavior, and suggest connectome-reconfigurations as a mechanism of adult skill learning.
Affektive (Empathie und Mitgefühl) und kognitive (Theory of Mind (ToM)) neuronale Netzwerke liege... more Affektive (Empathie und Mitgefühl) und kognitive (Theory of Mind (ToM)) neuronale Netzwerke liegen unserem Verständnis Anderer zugrunde. Inwieweit diese Netzwerke direkt trennbar sind, ob sie einander bedingen, d.h. ob hohe Empathie-Fähigkeit auch gute ToM-Fertigkeiten bedeutet, und wie sie zusammenarbeiten ist unbekannt. Im Rahmen der ReSource-Studie, einer 9-Monats-Trainings-Studie mit Modulen zu Achtsamkeit, Affekt und Perspektivübernahme sind wir sowohl diesen Fragen, als auch der differentiellen Plastizität der Netzwerke nachgegangen. Die neu-entwickelte Aufgabe ‚EmpaToM‘ konfrontiert Probanden (N=178) im fMRT mit naturalistischen Videos in denen emotionale oder neutrale Episoden berichtet werden. Auf jedes Video folgt eine Frage zum Inhalt des Videos, die entweder ToM oder logisches Schlussfolgern testet. Die Ergebnisse zeigen klare Trennbarkeit der Netzwerke, die während des Online-Verständnisses Anderer miteinander kommunizieren. Hohe Empathie-Fähigkeit geht dabei nicht automatisch mit guten ToM-Fertigkeiten einher. Besonders bedeutsam für die Psychotherapieforschung sind differentielle Effekte der verschiedenen Module, die zeigen, dass sozio-affektive und -kognitive Fähigkeiten separat trainiert werden können
Mindfulness-and, more generally, meditation-based interventions increasingly gain popularity, eff... more Mindfulness-and, more generally, meditation-based interventions increasingly gain popularity, effectively promoting cognitive, affective, and social capacities. It is unclear, however, if different types of practice have the same or specific effects on mental functioning. Here we tested three consecutive three-month training modules aimed at cultivating either attention, socio-affective qualities (such as compassion), or socio-cognitive skills (such as theory of mind), in three training cohorts and a retest control cohort (N = 332). While attentional performance improved most consistently after attention training, compassion increased most after socio-affective training and theory of mind partially improved after socio-cognitive training. These results show that specific mental training practices are needed to induce plasticity in different domains of mental functioning, providing a foundation for evidence-based development of more targeted interventions adapted to the needs of different education, labor, and health settings.
Functional neuroimaging studies have suggested the existence of 2 largely distinct social cogniti... more Functional neuroimaging studies have suggested the existence of 2 largely distinct social cognition networks, one for theory of mind (taking others' cognitive perspective) and another for empathy (sharing others' affective states). To address whether these networks can also be dissociated at the level of brain structure, we combined behavioral phenotyping across multiple socio-cognitive tasks with 3-Tesla MRI cortical thickness and structural covariance analysis in 270 healthy adults, recruited across 2 sites. Regional thickness mapping only provided partial support for divergent substrates, highlighting that individual differences in empathy relate to left insular-opercular thickness while no correlation between thickness and mentalizing scores was found. Conversely, structural covariance analysis showed clearly divergent network modulations by socio-cognitive and-affective phenotypes. Specifically, individual differences in theory of mind related to structural integration between temporo-parietal and dorsomedial prefrontal regions while empathy modulated the strength of dorsal anterior insula networks. Findings were robust across both recruitment sites, suggesting generalizability. At the level of structural network embedding, our study provides a double dissociation between empathy and mentalizing. Moreover, our findings suggest that structural substrates of higher-order social cognition are reflected rather in interregional networks than in the the local anatomical markup of specific regions per se.
Meditation-based mental training interventions show great benefits for physical and mental health... more Meditation-based mental training interventions show great benefits for physical and mental health. However, it remains unclear how different types of mental practice differentially affect emotion processing at both the neuronal and the behavioural level. In the context of the ReSource project, 332 participants underwent an fMRI scan while performing an emotion reactivity task before and after three 3-month training modules cultivating 1) attention and interoceptive awareness (Presence); 2) socio-affective skills, such as compassion (Affect); 3) socio-cognitive skills, such as theory of mind (Perspective). Only the Affect module led to a significant reduction of experienced negative affect when processing images depicting human suffering. This decrease in emotion reactivity was associated with increased activation in cognitive control and emotion-regulation regions such as lateral parietal and prefrontal brain regions. We conclude that socio-affective, but not attention-or meta-cognitive based mental training is specifically efficient to improve emotion regulation capacities when facing adversity.
Social neuroscience has identified different neural networks, a more affective (empathy and compa... more Social neuroscience has identified different neural networks, a more affective (empathy and compassion) and a more cognitive route (Theory of Mind (ToM)) to the understanding of others. While the anterior insula (AI) is critically involved when empathizing with the pain of another person, experiencing compassion for another’s suffering activates a different network including the ventral striatum. ToM tasks, in contrast, engage the temporoparietal junction (TPJ), temporal poles (TP) and medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). To study the separability and interrelations of these neural networks as well as their plasticity, we developed a novel paradigm, the EmpaToM. In the EmpaToM task, participants were presented with naturalistic video stimuli in which people recount autobiographical episodes that are either emotional or neutral. Each video is followed by empathy and compassion ratings and questions about the content of the video that probe ToM. Participants were tested before and after each training module in a 3T Scanner. At baseline, emotional vs. neutral videos increased activity in bilateral AI, which parametrically modulated with subjective empathy ratings. Compassion ratings, in contrast, covaried with activity in the ventral striatum. ToM activated bilateral TPJ, TP and MPFC. Inter-individual differences in the activity of these networks were uncorrelated, suggesting independence of these socio-affective and -cognitive abilities. Training in the Perspective, but not the Presence or Affective Module, enhanced performance in ToM questions. The compassion ratings, in contrast, increased more after the Affective and Perspective module, not so however after the Presence module. Similarly, differential change was also observed with regards to the neural networks underlying compassion and ToM. The present results confirm that the neural networks underlying empathy, compassion and ToM can be reliably identified within a single task and also demonstrate their independence on an inter-individual level – strong empathizers are not (necessarily) good mentalizers. Most critically, the training-related changes indicate that Theory of Mind can be trained by specific practices implemented in the Perspective Module. Surprisingly, there was an increase in experienced compassion after both, the Affective and the Perspective Modules. As no effect was observed after the Presence Module, which focused on attention and interoceptive awareness, the readiness to experience compassion seems to only increase after modules involving intersubjective exercises focusing on prosocial affect and motivation (Affective) or cognitive perspective taking of self and others (Perspective). In conclusion, these results provide first evidence that we can induce plasticity in socio-affective and socio-cognitive capacities through specifically designed mental training programs
Introduction: The ability to understand other people's mind and feelings encompasses differen... more Introduction: The ability to understand other people's mind and feelings encompasses different abilities such as empathy, the ability to share affective states of others, and mentalizing, the ability to attribute mental states to others. Functional neuroimaging has identified distinct substrates of both empathy and mentalizing. While for example empathizing with the pain or suffering of others consistently involves dorsal anterior insula cortex (dAI), inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), and anterior midcingulate cortex (aMCC), mentalizing relates to activity in a network including dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC), posterior temporo-parietal junction (pTPJ), and superior temporal gyrus/sulcus (STG/STS). Whether this divergence is also found at the level of brain structure is unknown. Here, we employ MRI covariance analysis to jointly assess structural network substrates of individual differences in empathy and mentalizing. Methods: We studied 154 healthy participants (94 women, mean±SD age=40.5±9.5 years). We aggregated measures derived from multiple tasks (Samson et al., 2010; Klimecki et al., 2013; Kanske et al., in press) to create constructs of empathy and mentalizing. T1-weighted MRI was obtained using a 3T Siemens Verio scanner. FreeSurfer was used of generate cortical surface models and to measure cortical thickness (Fischl and Dale, 2000). Analysis was performed using SurfStat (Worsley et al., 2009). Based on intersections of task-based functional activations in the same subjects (Kanske et al., in press) and meta-analytical results (Lamm et al., 2011; Mar, 2011), we defined seeds involved in empathy (dAI, aMCC, IFG) and mentalizing pTPJ, STG/STS). We furthermore studied the right supramarginal gyrus (rSMG), a region proximal to the pTPJ that has been suggested to play a role in affective perspective taking (Silani et al., 2013). To map structural covariance networks, we correlated thickness of each seed with thickness across the entire cortical mantle. We studied the interaction between seed covariance strength and individual differences in empathy and mentalizing. Findings were corrected for multiple comparisons using random field theory. Results: We observed that individual differences in empathy and mentalizing related to the covariance of non-overlapping networks. Specifically, individuals with high empathy score had increased right dAI covariance to lateral prefrontal regions, whereas importantly, covariance of TPJ, dmPFC, STG/STS were not modulated by individual differences in empathy (Figure 1). On the other hand, individuals scoring high on mentalizing capacity had increased pTPJ and STG/STS network covariance to mPFC and TPJ (Figure 2). And again, no modulation of dAI, aMCC and IFG was observed by individual differences in mentalizing scores. Interestingly and in line with previous work, rSMG was modulated by empathy, but not mentalizing, to regions similar to the covariance network found in right dAI (Figure 3)
Social neuroscience has identified different neural networks, a more affective (empathy and compa... more Social neuroscience has identified different neural networks, a more affective (empathy and compassion) and a more cognitive route (Theory of Mind (ToM)), to the understanding of others. While the anterior insula (AI) is critically involved when empathizing with the pain of another person, experiencing compassion for another’s suffering activates a different network including the ventral striatum. ToM tasks, in contrast, engage the temporoparietal junction (TPJ), temporal poles (TP) and medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). The separability and interrelations of these two capacities and their related neural networks is, however, little understood. We, therefore, developed a novel task, the EmpaToM. Participants are presented with naturalistic video stimuli in which people recount autobiographical episodes that are either emotional or neutral. Each video is followed by empathy and compassion ratings and questions about the content of the video that probe ToM. Emotional vs. neutral videos increased activity in bilateral AI, which parametrically modulated with subjective empathy ratings. Compassion ratings, in contrast, covaried with activity in the ventral striatum. ToM activated bilateral TPJ, TP and MPFC. These two networks interact during the online understanding of others. However, inter-individual differences in the activity of these networks were uncorrelated, suggesting some independence, such that strong empathizers are not (necessarily) good mentalizers. Separate training of these capacities within the longitudinal ReSource study has differential enhancing effects on ToM performance and compassion, providing some first evidence that we can induce plasticity in socio-affective and socio-cognitive capacities
This is a PDF file of an article that has undergone enhancements after acceptance, such as the ad... more This is a PDF file of an article that has undergone enhancements after acceptance, such as the addition of a cover page and metadata, and formatting for readability, but it is not yet the definitive version of record. This version will undergo additional copyediting, typesetting and review before it is published in its final form, but we are providing this version to give early visibility of the article. Please note that, during the production process, errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain.
A classical model of human attention holds that independent neural networks realize stimulus-driv... more A classical model of human attention holds that independent neural networks realize stimulus-driven reorienting and executive control of attention. Questioning full independence, the two functions do, however, engage overlapping networks with activations in cingulo-opercular regions such as anterior insula (AI) and a reverse pattern of activation (stimulusdriven reorienting), and deactivation (executive control) in temporoparietal junction (TPJ). To test for independent versus shared neural mechanisms underlying stimulus-driven and executive control of attention, we used fMRI and a task that isolates individual from concurrent demands in both functions. Results revealed super-additive increases of left AI activity and behavioral response costs under concurrent demands, suggesting a common bottleneck for stimulus-driven reorienting and executive control of attention. These increases were mirrored by non-additive decreases of activity in the default mode network (DMN), including posterior TPJ, regions where activity increased with off-task processes. The deactivations in posterior TPJ were spatially separated from stimulus-driven reorienting related activation in anterior TPJ, a differentiation that replicated in task-free resting state. Furthermore, functional connectivity indicated inhibitory coupling between posterior TPJ and AI during concurrent attention demands. These results demonstrate a role of AI in stimulus-driven and executive control of attention that involves down-regulation of internally directed processes in DMN.
Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, Jul 21, 2016
One important aspect of metacognition is the ability to accurately evaluate one's performance. Pe... more One important aspect of metacognition is the ability to accurately evaluate one's performance. People vary widely in their metacognitive ability and in general are too confident when evaluating their performance. This often leads to poor decision making with potentially disastrous consequences. To further our understanding of the neural underpinnings of these processes, this fMRI study investigated inter-individual differences in metacognitive ability and effects of trial-by-trial variation in subjective feelings of confidence when making metacognitive assessments. Participants (N ¼ 308) evaluated their performance in a high-level social and cognitive reasoning task. The results showed that higher metacognitive accuracy was associated with a decrease in activation in the anterior medial prefrontal cortex, an area previously linked to metacognition on perception and memory. Moreover, the feeling of confidence about one's choices was associated with an increase of activation in reward, memory and motor related areas including bilateral striatum and hippocampus, while less confidence was associated with activation in areas linked with negative affect and uncertainty, including dorsomedial prefrontal and bilateral orbitofrontal cortex. This might indicate that positive affect is related to higher confidence thereby biasing metacognitive decisions towards overconfidence. In support, behavioural analyses revealed that increased confidence was associated with lower metacognitive accuracy.
Although neuroscientific research has revealed experience-dependent brain changes across the life... more Although neuroscientific research has revealed experience-dependent brain changes across the life span in sensory, motor, and cognitive domains, plasticity relating to social capacities remains largely unknown. To investigate whether the targeted mental training of different cognitive and social skills can induce specific changes in brain morphology, we collected longitudinal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data throughout a 9-month mental training intervention from a large sample of adults between 20 and 55 years of age. By means of various daily mental exercises and weekly instructed group sessions, training protocols specifically addressed three functional domains: (i) mindfulness-based attention and interoception, (ii) socio-affective skills (compassion, dealing with difficult emotions, and prosocial motivation), and (iii) socio-cognitive skills (cognitive perspective-taking on self and others and metacognition). MRIbased cortical thickness analyses, contrasting the different training modules against each other, indicated spatially diverging changes in cortical morphology. Training of present-moment focused attention mostly led to increases in cortical thickness in prefrontal regions, socio-affective training induced plasticity in frontoinsular regions, and sociocognitive training included change in inferior frontal and lateral temporal cortices. Module-specific structural brain changes correlated with training-induced behavioral improvements in the same individuals in domain-specific measures of attention, compassion, and cognitive perspective-taking, respectively, and overlapped with task-relevant functional networks. Our longitudinal findings indicate structural plasticity in well-known socio-affective and socio-cognitive brain networks in healthy adults based on targeted short daily mental practices. These findings could promote the development of evidence-based mental training interventions in clinical, educational, and corporate settings aimed at cultivating social intelligence, prosocial motivation, and cooperation.
Training the capacity to self-generate emotions can be a potent "vaccine" against negative stress... more Training the capacity to self-generate emotions can be a potent "vaccine" against negative stressors and be an effective intervention for affective psychopathology. However, due to a lack of knowledge about sources of individual differences in generation abilities, it is unclear how to optimally design such interventions. We investigated one potential source of variation, namely preference for using different information modalities (Visual Imagery, Auditory Imagery, Bodily Interoception, and Semantic Analysis). A representative sample of 293 participants self-induced positive and negative emotional states, freely choosing to use these modalities singly or in combination. No evidence was found for modality usage being associated with differential efficacy at generating of positive or negative emotion. Rather, usage of all modalities (except Auditory Imagery) predicted success at generation of both positive and negative emotional states. Increasing age predicted capacity to generate, especially negative, emotions. While no specific combinations of modalities were superior, the overall degree to which participants adopted multimodal implementations did predict generation efficacy. These findings inform interventions aimed at improving emotional self-generation, suggesting these must be mindful of individual differences in generation abilities and implementation tendencies, and that they should focus on enhancing the capacity to use multiple modalities.
The emotional matching paradigm, introduced by Hariri and colleagues in 2000, is a widely used ne... more The emotional matching paradigm, introduced by Hariri and colleagues in 2000, is a widely used neuroimaging experiment that reliably activates the amygdala. In the classic version of the experiment faces with negative emotional expression and scenes depicting distressing events are compared with geometric shapes instead of neutral stimuli of the same category (i.e. faces or scenes). This makes it difficult to clearly attribute amygdala activation to the emotional valence and not to the social content. To improve this paradigm, we conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging study in which emotionally neutral and, additionally, positive stimuli within each stimulus category (i.e. faces, social and non-social scenes) were included. These categories enabled us to differentiate the exact nature of observed effects in the amygdala. First, the main findings of the original paradigm were replicated. Second, we observed amygdala activation when comparing negative to neutral stimuli of the same category. However, for negative faces, the amygdala response habituated rapidly. Third, positive stimuli were associated with widespread activation including the insula and the caudate. This validated adaption study enables more precise statements on the neural activation underlying emotional processing. These advances may benefit future studies on identifying selective impairments in emotional and social stimulus processing. Amygdala functioning is of high interest for clinical psychology, psychiatry and neuroscience, as heightened amygdala activation has been reported in various patient groups 1-5. The emotional matching paradigm by Hariri et al. 6 and its extended version 7 are widely used as emotional reactivity measures, which reliably activate the amygdala 8-10. Despite its current use in psychiatry, this paradigm has a potential drawback since faces with negative emotional expressions and negative social scenes are compared with simple geometric shapes. Thus, it compares pictures that differ in more than one domain: social content and emotional valence. It is therefore difficult to draw conclusions about which of the two different domains causes the increase in amygdala activation. This differentiation may arguably not be relevant for all purposes, but to study specific populations, such as patients with deficits in one or the other domain (e.g. those with autism spectrum disorder (ASD)) 11,12 , it is crucial to distinguish the two. A second issue is that negative emotions have been studied more widely than positive emotions, as exemplified by the original emotional matching paradigm, putatively due to their high functional value for action. For example previous research suggests that threatening scenes, whether they contained faces or no human features, elicited activation in the extrastriate body area, suggesting that this activity to threatening scenes, represents the capacity of the brain to associate certain situations with threat, in order to prepare for fast reactions 13. Positive emotions are, however, the other side of the coin, as they allow psychological growth and well-being 14. Positive stimuli are most commonly used in the context of reward experiments, for example in performance-based feedback tasks 15,16. A brain region that has been related to the processing of various reward types, ranging from primary reinforcers to more abstract social rewards 17,18 , is the ventral striatum 19. Also, meta-analytically, the ventral striatum elicits the strongest activation across the different reward types such as monetary, food and erotic rewards 20. The amygdala was also found to be activated in response to positive stimuli. For direct comparisons of positive and negative faces, not all studies found amygdala activation differences 21 , but a meta-analysis of
Successful social interactions require both affect sharing (empathy) and understanding others' me... more Successful social interactions require both affect sharing (empathy) and understanding others' mental states (Theory of Mind, ToM). As these two functions have mostly been investigated in isolation, the specificity of the underlying neural networks and the relation of these networks to the respective behavioral indices could not be tested. Here, we present a novel fMRI paradigm (EmpaToM) that independently manipulates both empathy and ToM. Experiments 1a/b (N = 90) validated the task with established empathy and ToM paradigms on a behavioral and neural level. Experiment 2 (N = 178) employed the EmpaToM and revealed clearly separable neural networks including anterior insula for empathy and ventral temporoparietal junction for ToM. These distinct networks could be replicated in task-free resting state functional connectivity. Importantly, brain activity in these two networks specifically predicted the respective behavioral indices, that is, inter-individual differences in ToM related brain activity predicted inter-individual differences in ToM performance, but not empathic responding, and vice versa. Taken together, the validated EmpaToM allows separation of affective and cognitive routes to understanding others. It may thus benefit future clinical, developmental, and intervention studies on identifying selective impairments and improvement in specific components of social cognition.
The neural networks associated with socio-affective (empathy, compassion) and socio-cognitive pro... more The neural networks associated with socio-affective (empathy, compassion) and socio-cognitive processes (mentalizing/Theory of Mind) have been well-characterized over the last years. The goal of the present talk is twofold: (1) To explore the separability of these functions during online social understanding on a subjective, behavioral and on a neural level and (2) to investigate the embedding of the related neural substrates in large-scale task-free neural networks. To this end, we acquired resting state as well as behavioral and neuroimaging data (fMRI) during a social video task in a large sample of participants (N = 178). The videos were short autobiographical narrations of emotionally negative and neutral events that allowed for asking Theory of Mind questions about the thoughts of the narrators and factual reasoning questions about the content of the stories, thereby allowing for independent assessment of socio-affective and socio-cognitive processing. Linking the phenomenological with the neural level, participants reported increased negative affect after emotional stories, which covaried with activity strength in the meta-analytically defined “empathy network”, but not with activity in the “Theory of Mind network”. Vice versa, performance in answering the Theory of Mind questions correlated with “Theory of Mind network”, but not “empathy network” activity. Interestingly, neither behavioral markers of social affect and mentalizing (i.e. emotional valence ratings and Theory of Mind performance) nor activity in the two respective neural networks correlated with each other. Furthermore, resting state functional connectivity to task activation based seed regions for empathy and Theory of Mind yielded distinct networks that strongly overlapped with the respective task activations and correspond to the well-described default mode network (Theory of Mind seeds) and the salience or central executive network (empathy). The data strongly argue for dissociable and independent socio-affective and -cognitive functions that are embedded in large-scale task-unrelated neural circuits
Uploads
Papers by Tania Singer