经颅磁刺激和经颅直流电刺激在调控大脑共情功能中的应用

共情可以帮助人们建立和谐的人际关系，更好地适应现实社会，是一种重要的社会认知功能。已有研究表明，诸多神经和精神类疾病的发生发展和复发与共情缺陷有关。非侵入性脑刺激技术（经颅磁刺激和经颅直流电刺激）可以通过调节大脑皮层兴奋性来调控个体的共情水平，缓解共情缺陷症状。针对健康群体使用该技术的现有证据显示：内侧前额叶、初级运动皮层、额下回、背外侧前额叶和颞顶交界处的活动有助于提升个体的认知共情水平，其中双侧背外侧前额叶的活动还有助于下调个体的情感共情水平，而右侧颞顶交界处的活动则可以增强自我表征从而支持个体在共情时进行自我和他人的区分。少数针对共情缺陷群体使用该技术的临床证据提示，增强左侧背外侧前额叶和内侧前额叶的活动可以分别提升精神疾病和神经退行性疾病患者的认知共情水平。未来的研究应探讨在统一的行为测量范式下针对不同刺激参数和刺激位点进行共情干预研究，通过融合其他神经生理技术进一步考察非侵入性脑刺激技术改善共情功能的作用机制，并考虑个体差异性对大脑共情功能干预效果的影响。     

共情让大鼠减少“损人利己”的行为

同理心或共情(empathy)是一种分享他人感受的能力。从上世纪60年代开始,人们开始通过动物实验对共情的产生机制及其特征进行研究。但在这些实验中,受害者(victim)所接受的伤害性刺激均依赖于实验者外在施加。2020年3月,荷兰阿姆斯特丹大学Christian Keysers实验室发表文章报道(Curr Biol,2020,30949~961.e7),他们建立了一种大鼠通过主动压杆获取奖赏刺激,同时引发对同伴伤害性刺激的行为学测试模型。在此模型基础上,作者探讨了共情行为的特性及相关脑机制。     

共情的毕生发展及其神经基础

共情是指个体感知或想象他人的情绪状态,部分体验到他人感受,并做出适当反应的能力.当前时代背景下,从神经科学角度出发,采用神经影像学方法,探究共情的神经基础,把握共情的毕生发展规律,并针对性地提升个体共情能力对社会发展至关重要.目前的研究发现,共情的发展具有阶段性,个体的共情于婴幼儿期便已开始萌芽;儿童中期开始,个体共情反应表现得更加灵活、可控;从青少年到成年早期,个体的共情发展已趋于成熟;进入成年中晚期后情绪共情回升,认知共情有所下降.目前共情神经基础领域的研究多集中在儿童期、青少年期和成年早期,着重探讨共情相关的大脑区域和大脑网络,以及个体的共情水平、特点与大脑结构或功能特征之间的关系.本文在梳理以往共情毕生发展和神经科学相关研究的基础上,从测量、技术路线、研究切入点以及研究成果转化等方面对该领域的未来研究方向进行了展望,并对国内该领域研究的发展路线进行了一定规划.     

人类共情领域认知神经科学:研究展望与应用启示

共情是人类的高级情感能力之一,能够抑制攻击倾向,激发亲社会行为.良好的共情能力有助于和谐人际关系的形成,对个体自身的身心健康及社会稳定都具有积极作用.一直以来,行为学测评技术在共情研究领域占据主导地位,在儿童青少年时期的研究已取得较为丰硕的成果.随着现代脑成像技术的发展,共情研究进入新的历史阶段,人类共情领域认知神经机制的探索逐步展开.本文通过梳理人类共情的毕生发展规律,论述了共情及其发展的神经机制,并在此基础上展望了学科未来发展方向,即未来研究需进一步探察共情毕生发展规律的脑机制;开发高信效度测评工具以完善共情研究体系;搭建大数据跨文化研究平台,实现多学科协同创新发展.此外,基于基础研究结论,本文阐述了共情相关认知神经研究对教育和健康领域的启示.教育方面,基于儿童青少年大脑发展规律,应寻找共情发展的关键期,开展建设学校、家庭和社会共同培育的共情能力体系;健康方面,首先,结合共情的脑科学研究发现,预测和识别异常共情发展;其次,可结合机器学习,开发临床共情相关的应用技术与产品;最后,以镜像神经系统为窗口,开展共情相关的类脑研究等.这些探索将在国家教育和健康战略规划以及科技发展等层面产生重要的现实意义.     

恐惧记忆消退的表观遗传学机制

恐惧是一种特殊的情感,形成恐惧记忆的能力对于动物及人类检测和应对危险至关重要。近几年研究发现,表观遗传学可以在多个层面调控恐惧记忆,如组蛋白乙酰化与DNA甲基化在恐惧记忆消退过程中发挥重要作用。动物模型中的许多研究表明,适度的表观遗传调节对于学习记忆过程是必要的,表观遗传学机制失调将导致行为水平的认知缺陷,并且表观遗传失调已被越来越多地认为是各种精神疾病的重要因素,如创伤后应激障碍(post-traumatic stress disorder,PTSD)。因此,理解记忆形成的机制具有巨大的科学意义以及社会和医疗效益。     

雄激素受体共调节因子及其在前列腺癌进展中的作用

雄激素受体（AR）信号通路在前列腺癌的发生、进展和转移中发挥着重要作用,但AR介导组织对雄激素的特异应答是通过与其相互作用的AR共调节因子共同完成的,许多AR共调节因子的功能已被广泛研究。简要综述了目前发现的部分AR共调节因子在调节AR转录活性及前列腺癌发生、进展中的生物学作用。     

痛觉预期的神经生理研究进展

疼痛是一种复杂的感觉和情绪体验,除了伤害性刺激本身的理化性质外,不同的心理和认知状态对痛感受也有很大的影响。其中一个可以显著调节疼痛的心理因素就是预期。本文将对近年来有关痛觉预期的神经生物学机制研究进展做一简要综述。     

宽恕心理的影响因素综述

宽恕与心理健康高度相关,宽恕的干预实施能有效提高人们的心理健康水平.本文采用文献分析法,对新近关于宽恕心理影响因素的研究成果进行梳理、归类,以探讨宽恕心理的影响因素及其作用机制,为宽恕的有效干预实施提供理论依据和实践指导.宽恕心理的影响因素来自受害者的共情、人格特质、认知归因、反思,冒犯者的态度及道歉,受害者与冒犯者的人际亲密程度、社会文化背景等三方面因素.最后,就宽恕心理的作用机制.研究者提出了自已的构想.     

细菌-噬菌体对抗性共进化研究进展 *

共进化现象在自然界中普遍存在。细菌和细菌的天敌噬菌体之间的对抗是一场持久战,细菌-噬菌体系统是研究共进化的模式材料。目前关于细菌-噬菌体对抗性共进化的机制有两种公认的模型,即GFG模型和MA模型,对应于两种模式,即ARD模式和FSD模式;主要采用Time-Shift Assays方法测定细菌-噬菌体的对抗性共进化动力学模式。长尾噬菌体是有尾噬菌体中最大的家族。目前关于细菌-噬菌体系统共进化的研究主要集中在短尾和肌尾噬菌体与其宿主之间,而细菌-长尾噬菌体共进化的研究报道较少。     

痛觉的脑功能成像研究进展

本文综述了近年来关于痛觉功能性脑成像的研究进展,痛觉的感觉辨别成分似与外侧丘脑、初级和次级躯体感觉区及岛叶皮层有关,而伤害性信息的认知－注意过程则与顶叶后部和前额中皮层有关。扣带回的不同部分调节着痛觉认知和情感的不同方面。文章最后对临床各种疼痛特别是神经源性痛病人的成像研究进行了分析。     

Empathy in chimpanzees: Evidence for theory of mind?

Empathy can be widely defined as the capacity to understand the emotional, visual, or cognitive perspective of another individual and is perhaps reliant on the ability to attribute mental states. Behavioural events that may indicate empathy in chimpanzees,Pan troglodytes, are collated (1) using a questionnaire and (2) from the literature. These case studies are classified in a taxonomy of empathic acts in which empathy is categorized as visual empathy, emotional empathy, concordance and extended empathy. In addition, the circumstances surrounding the empathic acts are discussed: whether the recipient of the empathic act was a relative, an unfamiliar individual, or a heterospecific. The cost to the animal showing empathy, whether it displayed any levels of intentionality and if it communicated to a third party are also analyzed. Rescuing of an individual from a dangerous social or physical situation is the only category where the animal shows empathy under all the specified conditions. From this preliminary analysis it seems the chimpanzees may be capable of showing empathy across a wide range of circumstances.     

Disentangling cognitive processes from neural activation and psychic mechanisms: The example of empathy

Empathy processes can be explored within a three-level model distinguishing neuronal, cognitive and intra-psychic operating levels. Cognitive and intra-psychic processes need not to be collapsed. Neural systems involved in empathy are described through neuroimaging and event-related potential (ERP) studies. On the cognitive level, empathy is threefold: procedural, semantic and biographical. Automatically activated since birth, procedural empathy processes are deeply enrooted in visuo-motor response capacities and responsible for automatic mimicry. These processes might rely on a prior sensori-motor contagion system. Semantic empathy parallels language development and expresses connexion between words, meaning and emotion. Biographical emerges later in life and corresponds to the interweaving of personal experience with feelings and words, together with a capacity to bridge with the others’ experiences. On the intra-psychic level, defence mechanisms as well as identification processes, depicted from a subjective and interpersonal standpoint, are corresponding, without being similar, to empathetic processes described in cognitive neuroscience studies. Studies on semantic empathy need to control for the participants biographical information and concomitant memory activation. The interface between cognitive and intra-psychic processes needs to be further investigated.     

Effect of empathy trait on attention to faces: an event-related potential (ERP) study

Background

Empathy is deeply linked with the ability to adapt to human social environments. The present study investigated the relationship between the empathy trait and attention elicited by discriminating facial expressions.

Methods

Event-related potentials were measured while 32 participants (17 men and 15 women) discriminated facial expressions (happy or angry) and colors of flowers (yellow or purple) under an oddball paradigm. The empathy trait of participants was measured using the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (Davis, 1980).

Results

The empathy trait correlated positively with both the early portion (300 to 600 ms after stimulus onset) and late portion (600 to 800 ms after stimulus onset) of late positive potential (LPP) amplitude elicited by faces, but not with LPP elicited by flowers.

Conclusions

This result suggests that, compared to people with low empathy, people with high empathy pay more attention when discriminating facial expressions. The present study suggests that differences exist in methods of adapting to social environments between people with high and low empathy.     

Children with pets do not show higher empathy: A challenge to current views

Abstract

A group of children (n=137) were surveyed with respect to pet ownership and pet preferences to explore the link between the human–animal bond and empathy. The most notable findings—and contrary to our predictions—were: (1) there was no difference in empathy (Bryan Empathy Index) between pet owners and non-owners; (2) there was no correlation between empathy and attachment to pets (Companion Animal Bonding Scale); and (3) higher empathy scores were not related to pet-preference indicators. A more fine-grained examination of the pet-owning group only revealed differences with respect to type of animal owned. Higher empathy was evident with dog ownership as opposed to other pet types. However, this needs to be tempered by the equally interesting observation that lower empathy was related to cat ownership. Regardless of how ownership groups are configured, there is consistent evidence that differentiates cat owners (lower empathy) from dog owners (higher empathy). When pet ownership and pet preference are combined to form new groupings, again, the cat effects and dog effects are evident. Implications extend to the need: (1) for future research on the nature of the human–animal bond; (2) to explore the relationship between personality and animal bonding; and (3) to refine the questions surrounding the animal-based links to empathy, as well as other related constructs such as prosocial behaviour, compassion, self-esteem, self-control, autonomy, affection, stress, responsibility, and perhaps even emotional intelligence, career paths and community service.     

Inter-individual relationships in empathic traits and feedback-related fronto-central brain activity: an event-related potential study

Background

Neuroimaging studies continue to indicate the major role the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) plays in processing empathic responses. Error-related negativity (ERN), an event-related potential (ERP) thought to arise from the ACC, has been found to correlate with scores for individual empathic personality. This study investigated the relationship between empathic personality traits and the amplitude of feedback-related negativity (FRN), an ERP sourced from the ACC and similar to the ERN, using a task involving feedback of monetary gains or losses.

Methods

Sixteen healthy participants answered an empathy trait questionnaire and performed a gambling task to elicit FRN. Because FRN amplitude is thought to be associated with attention, motivation, emotional state, and anxiety trait, we performed a partial correlation analysis between the empathic trait score and FRN amplitude while controlling for variables.

Results

In partial correlation analysis, FRN amplitude was significantly inversely correlated with scores for personal distress and marginally correlated with scores for empathic concern and with total average score.

Discussion

The study revealed for the first time an association between FRN and emotional empathic traits, after controlling for variables that can affect FRN amplitude. However, we also found a reversed directional correlation contrary to our expectations. This fronto-central brain activity may be associated with empathic properties via dopaminergic neuronal function. Future study using these electric potentials as experimental tools is expected to help elucidate the neurological mechanism of empathy.

     

Une anatomie de l’empathie

Empathy refers to an emotional response that emanates either from the emotional state of another individual or from adopting another’ psychological point of view without losing sight of whose feelings belong to whom. This response is contingent on emotional as well as cognitive factors. Empathy involves not only the affective experience of the other person’s actual or inferred emotional state but also some minimal recognition and understanding of another’s emotional state. This article proposes, in the light of multiple levels of analysis ranging from clinical psychology, cognitive neuroscience and neuropsychology, a model of empathy that involves parallel and distributed processing in a number of dissociable computational mechanisms (in the prefrontal and parietal cortices of the right hemisphere). Affective sharing, self-awareness, mental flexibility and emotion regulation constitute the basic macro-components of empathy, which are underpinned by specific neural systems. This functional model is used to make specific predictions about the various empathy deficits that can be encountered in different forms of social and neurological disorders.     

Selfish or selfless? The role of empathy in economics

Empathy is a longstanding issue in economics, especially for welfare economics, but one which has faded from the scene in recent years. However, with the rise of neuroeconomics, there is now a renewed interest in this subject. Some economists have even gone so far as to suggest that neuroscientific experiments reveal heterogeneous empathy levels across individuals. If this were the case, this would be in line with economists'' usual assumption of stable and given preferences and would greatly facilitate the study of prosocial behaviour with which empathy is often associated. After reviewing some neuroscientific psychological and neuroeconomic evidence on empathy, we will, however, criticize the notion of a given empathy distribution in the population by referring to recent experiments on a public goods game that suggest that, on the contrary, the degree of empathy that individuals exhibit is very much dependent on context and social interaction.     

The Scalpel and the Butterfly: The Conflict between Animal Research and Animal Protection Deborah Rudacille

ABSTRACT

Although there is a substantial body of research on inter-human empathy and inter-animal empathy, there is a dearth of research comparing humans' empathic reactions to humans and animals. To address this issue, three experiments were conducted in which participants read a scenario about a human or animal abuse victim in need of medical attention, and indicated the degree of empathy they had on an emotional response scale. In Experiment 1, women had significantly more empathy for animals than for humans, whereas men tended to express more empathy for humans than for animals. In Experiment 2, adult women expressed the same degree of empathy for a child as for a puppy. Similarly, in Experiment 3, adult men and women expressed the same degree of empathy for a baby as for a puppy. Overall, results indicated that people feel at least as much empathy for animals as for humans. We suggest that an animal target elicits a great deal of empathy partly because it is perceived as not being responsible for having caused the need situation. Future research will show whether empathy for animals translates to prosocial behavior toward them as well.     

Interaction between valence of empathy and familiarity: is it difficult to empathize with the positive events of a stranger?

Background

Empathy in humans is thought to have evolved via social interactions caused by the formation of social groups. Considering the role of empathy within a social group, there might be a difference between emotional empathy for strangers and familiar others belonging to the same social group. In this study, we used the global field power (GFP) index to investigate empathic brain activity during observation of a cue indicating either a negative or positive image viewed by a stranger or close friend.

Methods

Sixteen healthy participants observed a partner performing an emotional gambling task displayed on a monitor. After the partner''s choice-response, a frowning or smiling face symbol was simultaneously presented to the participant’s monitor while a negative or positive emotional image was presented to the partner’s monitor. All participants observed a control condition (CT) showing a computer trial, a stranger-observation condition (SO) showing the trial of a stranger, and a friend-observation condition (FO) to observe the trial of a close friend. During these observations, participants’ event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded to calculate GFP, and after the task, a subjective assessment of their feelings was measured.

Results

Positive emotion was significantly larger under the FO compared to the CT and the SO. Significantly larger negative emotion was found under the SO and FO compared to the CT. In response to a positive cue, significantly larger GFP during 300 to 600 ms was observed under the FO compared to the CT and SO. In response to a negative cue, significantly larger GFP was observed under the FO and SO compared to the CT. A significantly larger GFP under the SO was found in response to only a negative cue. Topographic map analysis suggested that these differences were related to frontal-occipital dynamics. GFP was significantly correlated with empathic trait.

Conclusion

These results revealed that familiarity with another person has different effects depending on the valence of empathy. Negative empathy, including the danger perception function, might easily occur even among strangers, whereas positive empathy related to nursing and supporting an inner group does not happen easily with strangers.