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An fMRI study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy

While it is well established that individuals with psychopathy have a marked deficit in affective arousal, emotional empathy, and caring for the well-being of others, the extent to which perspective taking can elicit an emotional response has not yet been studied despite its potential application in...

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Autores principales: Decety, Jean, Chen, Chenyi, Harenski, Carla, Kiehl, Kent A.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3782696/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24093010
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2013.00489
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author Decety, Jean
Chen, Chenyi
Harenski, Carla
Kiehl, Kent A.
author_facet Decety, Jean
Chen, Chenyi
Harenski, Carla
Kiehl, Kent A.
author_sort Decety, Jean
collection PubMed
description While it is well established that individuals with psychopathy have a marked deficit in affective arousal, emotional empathy, and caring for the well-being of others, the extent to which perspective taking can elicit an emotional response has not yet been studied despite its potential application in rehabilitation. In healthy individuals, affective perspective taking has proven to be an effective means to elicit empathy and concern for others. To examine neural responses in individuals who vary in psychopathy during affective perspective taking, 121 incarcerated males, classified as high (n = 37; Hare psychopathy checklist-revised, PCL-R ≥ 30), intermediate (n = 44; PCL-R between 21 and 29), and low (n = 40; PCL-R ≤ 20) psychopaths, were scanned while viewing stimuli depicting bodily injuries and adopting an imagine-self and an imagine-other perspective. During the imagine-self perspective, participants with high psychopathy showed a typical response within the network involved in empathy for pain, including the anterior insula (aINS), anterior midcingulate cortex (aMCC), supplementary motor area (SMA), inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), somatosensory cortex, and right amygdala. Conversely, during the imagine-other perspective, psychopaths exhibited an atypical pattern of brain activation and effective connectivity seeded in the anterior insula and amygdala with the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC). The response in the amygdala and insula was inversely correlated with PCL-R Factor 1 (interpersonal/affective) during the imagine-other perspective. In high psychopaths, scores on PCL-R Factor 1 predicted the neural response in ventral striatum when imagining others in pain. These patterns of brain activation and effective connectivity associated with differential perspective-taking provide a better understanding of empathy dysfunction in psychopathy, and have the potential to inform intervention programs for this complex clinical problem.
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spelling pubmed-37826962013-10-03 An fMRI study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy Decety, Jean Chen, Chenyi Harenski, Carla Kiehl, Kent A. Front Hum Neurosci Neuroscience While it is well established that individuals with psychopathy have a marked deficit in affective arousal, emotional empathy, and caring for the well-being of others, the extent to which perspective taking can elicit an emotional response has not yet been studied despite its potential application in rehabilitation. In healthy individuals, affective perspective taking has proven to be an effective means to elicit empathy and concern for others. To examine neural responses in individuals who vary in psychopathy during affective perspective taking, 121 incarcerated males, classified as high (n = 37; Hare psychopathy checklist-revised, PCL-R ≥ 30), intermediate (n = 44; PCL-R between 21 and 29), and low (n = 40; PCL-R ≤ 20) psychopaths, were scanned while viewing stimuli depicting bodily injuries and adopting an imagine-self and an imagine-other perspective. During the imagine-self perspective, participants with high psychopathy showed a typical response within the network involved in empathy for pain, including the anterior insula (aINS), anterior midcingulate cortex (aMCC), supplementary motor area (SMA), inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), somatosensory cortex, and right amygdala. Conversely, during the imagine-other perspective, psychopaths exhibited an atypical pattern of brain activation and effective connectivity seeded in the anterior insula and amygdala with the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC). The response in the amygdala and insula was inversely correlated with PCL-R Factor 1 (interpersonal/affective) during the imagine-other perspective. In high psychopaths, scores on PCL-R Factor 1 predicted the neural response in ventral striatum when imagining others in pain. These patterns of brain activation and effective connectivity associated with differential perspective-taking provide a better understanding of empathy dysfunction in psychopathy, and have the potential to inform intervention programs for this complex clinical problem. Frontiers Media S.A. 2013-09-24 /pmc/articles/PMC3782696/ /pubmed/24093010 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2013.00489 Text en Copyright © 2013 Decety, Chen, Harenski and Kiehl. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Neuroscience
Decety, Jean
Chen, Chenyi
Harenski, Carla
Kiehl, Kent A.
An fMRI study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy
title An fMRI study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy
title_full An fMRI study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy
title_fullStr An fMRI study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy
title_full_unstemmed An fMRI study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy
title_short An fMRI study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy
title_sort fmri study of affective perspective taking in individuals with psychopathy: imagining another in pain does not evoke empathy
topic Neuroscience
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3782696/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24093010
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2013.00489
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