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.     

I Know How You Feel: The Warm-Altruistic Personality Profile and the Empathic Brain

The ability to empathize with other people is a critical component of human social relationships. Empathic processing varies across the human population, however it is currently unclear how personality traits are associated with empathic processing. This study was designed to test the hypothesis that specific personality traits are associated with behavioral and biological indicators of improved empathy. Extraversion and Agreeableness are personality traits designed to measure individual differences in social-cognitive functioning, however each trait-dimension includes elements that represent interpersonal social functioning and elements that do not represent interpersonal social functioning. We tested the prediction that interpersonal elements of Extraversion (Warmth) and Agreeableness (Altruism) are associated with empathy and non-interpersonal elements of Extraversion and Agreeableness are not associated with empathy. We quantified empathic processing behaviorally (empathic accuracy task using video vignettes) and within the brain (fMRI and an emotional perspective taking task) in 50 healthy subjects. Converging evidence shows that highly warm and altruistic people are well skilled in recognizing the emotional states of other people and exhibit greater activity in brain regions important for empathy (temporoparietal junction and medial prefrontal cortex) during emotional perspective taking. A mediation analysis further supported the association between warm-altruistic personality and empathic processing; indicating that one reason why highly warm-altruistic individuals may be skilled empathizers is that they engage the temporoparietal junction and medial prefrontal cortex more. Together, these findings advance the way the behavioral and neural basis of empathy is understood and demonstrates the efficacy of personality scales to measure individual differences in interpersonal social function.     

共情脑机制的研究现状与展望

作为社会交往中的重要因素,共情是指理解并体验他人的情感和知觉感受的能力。目前的研究认为共情依赖于直接的投射机制而非逻辑推理。即观察到他人的情绪状态会涉及一部分处理自我情感的大脑结构的激活,该过程同时还会受到社会认知因素的调节。由于理解和间接体验他人痛觉的能力是维系社会纽带必不可少的,目前研究者越来越多地通过对痛觉共情的研究来揭示关于共情的普遍的神经机制。此外共情的动物模型、镜像神经元系统与共情的产生以及共情的调节等方向也将是研究的重点。     

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.     

Attachment in integrative neuroscientific perspective

Attachment theory is a very influential general concept of human social and emotional development, which emphasizes the role of early mother-infant interactions for infant's adaptive behavioural and stress copying strategies, personality organization and mental health. Individuals with disrupted development of secure attachment to mother/primary caregiver are at higher risk of developing mental disorders. This theory consists of the complex developmental psycho-neurobiological model of attachment and emerges from principles of psychoanalysis, evolutionary biology, cognitive-developmental psychology, ethology, physiology and control systems theory. The progress of modern neuroscience enables interpretation of neurobiological aspects of the theory as multi-level neural interactions and functional development of important neural structures, effects of neuromediattors, hormones and essential neurobiological processes including emotional, cognitive, social interactions and the special key role of mentalizing. It has multiple neurobiological, neuroendocrine, neurophysiological, ethological, genetic, developmental, psychological, psychotherapeutic and neuropsychiatric consequences and is a prototype of complex neuroscientific concept as interpretation of modern integrated neuroscience.     

Anxious or Depressed and Still Happy?

This study aimed to examine cross-sectionally to what extent persons with higher symptom levels or a current or past emotional disorder report to be less happy than controls and to assess prospectively whether time-lagged measurements of extraversion and neuroticism predict future happiness independent of time-lagged measurements of emotional disorders or symptom severity. A sample of 2142 adults aged 18–65, consisting of healthy controls and persons with current or past emotional disorder according to DSM-IV criteria completed self-ratings for happiness and emotional well-being and symptom severity. Lagged measurements of personality, symptom severity and presence of anxiety and depressive disorder at T0 (year 0), T2 (year 2) and T4 (year 4) were used to predict happiness and emotional well-being at T6 (year 6) controlling for demographics. In particular persons with more depressive symptoms, major depressive disorder, social anxiety disorder and comorbid emotional disorders reported lower levels of happiness and emotional well-being. Depression symptom severity and to a lesser extent depressive disorder predicted future happiness and emotional well-being at T6. Extraversion and to a lesser extent neuroticism also consistently forecasted future happiness and emotional well-being independent of concurrent lagged measurements of emotional disorders and symptoms. A study limitation is that we only measured happiness and emotional well-being at T6 and our measures were confined to hedonistic well-being and did not include psychological and social well-being. In sum, consistent with the two continua model of emotional well-being and mental illness, a ‘happy’ personality characterized by high extraversion and to a lesser extent low neuroticism forecasts future happiness and emotional well-being independent of concurrently measured emotional disorders or symptom severity levels. Boosting positive emotionality may be an important treatment goal for persons personally inclined to lower levels of happiness.     

Investigating the Relationship between Stable Personality Characteristics and Automatic Imitation

Automatic imitation is a cornerstone of nonverbal communication that fosters rapport between interaction partners. Recent research has suggested that stable dimensions of personality are antecedents to automatic imitation, but the empirical evidence linking imitation with personality traits is restricted to a few studies with modest sample sizes. Additionally, atypical imitation has been documented in autism spectrum disorders and schizophrenia, but the mechanisms underpinning these behavioural profiles remain unclear. Using a larger sample than prior studies (N=243), the current study tested whether performance on a computer-based automatic imitation task could be predicted by personality traits associated with social behaviour (extraversion and agreeableness) and with disorders of social cognition (autistic-like and schizotypal traits). Further personality traits (narcissism and empathy) were assessed in a subsample of participants (N=57). Multiple regression analyses showed that personality measures did not predict automatic imitation. In addition, using a similar analytical approach to prior studies, no differences in imitation performance emerged when only the highest and lowest 20 participants on each trait variable were compared. These data weaken support for the view that stable personality traits are antecedents to automatic imitation and that neural mechanisms thought to support automatic imitation, such as the mirror neuron system, are dysfunctional in autism spectrum disorders or schizophrenia. In sum, the impact that personality variables have on automatic imitation is less universal than initial reports suggest.     

Contextual Social Cognition Impairments in Schizophrenia and Bipolar Disorder

Background

The ability to integrate contextual information with social cues to generate social meaning is a key aspect of social cognition. It is widely accepted that patients with schizophrenia and bipolar disorders have deficits in social cognition; however, previous studies on these disorders did not use tasks that replicate everyday situations.

Methodology/Principal Findings

This study evaluates the performance of patients with schizophrenia and bipolar disorders on social cognition tasks (emotional processing, empathy, and social norms knowledge) that incorporate different levels of contextual dependence and involvement of real-life scenarios. Furthermore, we explored the association between social cognition measures, clinical symptoms and executive functions. Using a logistic regression analysis, we explored whether the involvement of more basic skills in emotional processing predicted performance on empathy tasks. The results showed that both patient groups exhibited deficits in social cognition tasks with greater context sensitivity and involvement of real-life scenarios. These deficits were more severe in schizophrenic than in bipolar patients. Patients did not differ from controls in tasks involving explicit knowledge. Moreover, schizophrenic patients’ depression levels were negatively correlated with performance on empathy tasks.

Conclusions/Significance

Overall performance on emotion recognition predicted performance on intentionality attribution during the more ambiguous situations of the empathy task. These results suggest that social cognition deficits could be related to a general impairment in the capacity to implicitly integrate contextual cues. Important implications for the assessment and treatment of individuals with schizophrenia and bipolar disorders, as well as for neurocognitive models of these pathologies are discussed.     

Empathy as a driver of prosocial behaviour: highly conserved neurobehavioural mechanisms across species

Empathy reflects the natural ability to perceive and be sensitive to the emotional states of others, coupled with a motivation to care for their well-being. It has evolved in the context of parental care for offspring, as well as within kinship bonds, to help facilitate group living. In this paper, we integrate the perspectives of evolution, animal behaviour, developmental psychology, and social and clinical neuroscience to elucidate our understanding of the proximate mechanisms underlying empathy. We focus, in particular, on processing of signals of distress and need, and their relation to prosocial behaviour. The ability to empathize, both in animals and humans, mediates prosocial behaviour when sensitivity to others'' distress is paired with a drive towards their welfare. Disruption or atypical development of the neural circuits that process distress cues and integrate them with decision value leads to callous disregard for others, as is the case in psychopathy. The realization that basic forms of empathy exist in non-human animals is crucial for gaining new insights into the underlying neurobiological and genetic mechanisms of empathy, enabling translation towards therapeutic and pharmacological interventions.     

Validity and utility of Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology (HiTOP): III. Emotional dysfunction superspectrum

The Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology (HiTOP) is a quantitative nosological system that addresses shortcomings of traditional mental disorder diagnoses, including arbitrary boundaries between psychopathology and normality, frequent disorder co‐occurrence, substantial heterogeneity within disorders, and diagnostic unreliability over time and across clinicians. This paper reviews evidence on the validity and utility of the internalizing and somatoform spectra of HiTOP, which together provide support for an emotional dysfunction superspectrum. These spectra are composed of homogeneous symptom and maladaptive trait dimensions currently subsumed within multiple diagnostic classes, including depressive, anxiety, trauma‐related, eating, bipolar, and somatic symptom disorders, as well as sexual dysfunction and aspects of personality disorders. Dimensions falling within the emotional dysfunction superspectrum are broadly linked to individual differences in negative affect/neuroticism. Extensive evidence establishes that dimensions falling within the superspectrum share genetic diatheses, environmental risk factors, cognitive and affective difficulties, neural substrates and biomarkers, childhood temperamental antecedents, and treatment response. The structure of these validators mirrors the quantitative structure of the superspectrum, with some correlates more specific to internalizing or somatoform conditions, and others common to both, thereby underlining the hierarchical structure of the domain. Compared to traditional diagnoses, the internalizing and somatoform spectra demonstrated substantially improved utility: greater reliability, larger explanatory and predictive power, and greater clinical applicability. Validated measures are currently available to implement the HiTOP system in practice, which can make diagnostic classification more useful, both in research and in the clinic.     

Responding Empathically: A Question of Heart,not a Question of Skin

Empathy entails the capacities to resonate with another person’s emotions, understand his/her thoughts and feelings, separate our own thoughts and emotions from those of the observed and responding with the appropriate prosocial and helpful behavior. While there is abundant research on the neurobiological mechanisms of some components of empathy (e.g., emotional contagion), few studies have considered the neurobiological mechanisms underlying the empathic response. The present study explores psychophysiological correlates (skin conductance level and the interbeat interval) as a function of the empathic response while participants watch and respond to actors portraying emotionally laden vignettes. Forty undergraduate psychology students were each presented with 40 emotional vignettes of positive or negative valence and asked to choose among three different empathic responses while their electrodermal and cardiac responses were measured. Overall, the study shows that higher levels of additive empathy are associated with increased cardiac activity (i.e., decreased Interbeat Interval) but not electrodermal activity.     

The Paradox of Music-Evoked Sadness: An Online Survey

This study explores listeners’ experience of music-evoked sadness. Sadness is typically assumed to be undesirable and is therefore usually avoided in everyday life. Yet the question remains: Why do people seek and appreciate sadness in music? We present findings from an online survey with both Western and Eastern participants (N = 772). The survey investigates the rewarding aspects of music-evoked sadness, as well as the relative contribution of listener characteristics and situational factors to the appreciation of sad music. The survey also examines the different principles through which sadness is evoked by music, and their interaction with personality traits. Results show 4 different rewards of music-evoked sadness: reward of imagination, emotion regulation, empathy, and no “real-life” implications. Moreover, appreciation of sad music follows a mood-congruent fashion and is greater among individuals with high empathy and low emotional stability. Surprisingly, nostalgia rather than sadness is the most frequent emotion evoked by sad music. Correspondingly, memory was rated as the most important principle through which sadness is evoked. Finally, the trait empathy contributes to the evocation of sadness via contagion, appraisal, and by engaging social functions. The present findings indicate that emotional responses to sad music are multifaceted, are modulated by empathy, and are linked with a multidimensional experience of pleasure. These results were corroborated by a follow-up survey on happy music, which indicated differences between the emotional experiences resulting from listening to sad versus happy music. This is the first comprehensive survey of music-evoked sadness, revealing that listening to sad music can lead to beneficial emotional effects such as regulation of negative emotion and mood as well as consolation. Such beneficial emotional effects constitute the prime motivations for engaging with sad music in everyday life.     

Pro-sociality without empathy

Empathy, the capacity to recognize and share feelings experienced by another individual, is an important trait in humans, but is not the same as pro-sociality, the tendency to behave so as to benefit another individual. Given the importance of understanding empathy''s evolutionary emergence, it is unsurprising that many studies attempt to find evidence for it in other species. To address the question of what should constitute evidence for empathy, we offer a critical comparison of two recent studies of rescuing behaviour that report similar phenomena but are interpreted very differently by their authors. In one of the studies, rescue behaviour in rats was interpreted as providing evidence for empathy, whereas in the other, rescue behaviour in ants was interpreted without reference to sharing of emotions. Evidence for empathy requires showing that actor individuals possess a representation of the receiver''s emotional state and are driven by the psychological goal of improving its wellbeing. Proving psychological goal-directedness by current standards involves goal-devaluation and causal sensitivity protocols, which, in our view, have not been implemented in available publications. Empathy has profound significance not only for cognitive and behavioural sciences but also for philosophy and ethics and, in our view, remains unproven outside humans.     

The Effect of Emotional Distance on Psychophysiologic Concordance and Perceived Empathy Between Patient and Interviewer

– This preliminary study investigated the effect of emotional distance on psychophysiologic concordance and perceived empathy in a clinical population. Participants included 20 adult outpatients from a mental health clinic that underwent a brief semi-structured interview with a trained psychiatrist in either an emotionally neutral or an emotionally distant condition. Simultaneous skin conductance (SC) levels of the patient and interviewer were recorded and used to calculate a measure of psychophysiologic concordance. Interviewer gaze was rated by an independent observer and used as a proxy indicator of emotional distance. Observer ratings of interviewer gaze, SC concordance, and patient ratings of perceived interviewer empathy were significantly lower in the emotionally distant condition compared with the emotionally neutral condition (p < 0.05). Results suggest that increased emotional distance is associated with decreased psychophysiologic concordance and reduced subjective ratings of perceived empathy. The observed differences in psychophysiologic concordance support the use of this measure as a potential marker of empathy in a clinical population in an interview setting.     

Affective empathy and prosocial behavior in rodents

Empathy is an essential function for humans as social animals. Emotional contagion, the basic form of afffective empathy, comprises the cognitive process of perceiving and sharing the affective state of others. The observational fear assay, an animal model of emotional contagion, has enabled researchers to undertake molecular, cellular, and circuit mechanism of this behavior. Such studies have revealed that observational fear is mediated through neural circuits involved in processing the affective dimension of direct pain experiences. A mouse can also respond to milder social stimuli induced by either positive or negative emotional changes in another mouse, which seems not dependent on the affective pain circuits. Further studies should explore how different neural circuits contribute to integrating different dimensions of affective empathy.     

From shared to distinct self–other representations in empathy: evidence from neurotypical function and socio-cognitive disorders

Neuroscientific research has identified two fundamental components of empathy: shared emotional representations between self and other, and self–other distinction. The concept of shared representations suggests that during empathy, we co-represent another person''s affect by engaging brain and bodily functions underpinning the first-hand experience of the emotion we are empathizing with. This possible grounding of empathy in our own emotional experiences explains the necessity for self–other distinction, which is the capacity to correctly distinguish between our own affective representations and those related to the other. In spite of the importance of these two components in empathy, several aspects still remain controversial. This paper addresses some of them and focuses on (i) the distinction between shared activations versus representations, raising the question what shared representations entail in terms of the underlying neural mechanisms, (ii) the possible mechanisms behind self–other distinction in the cognitive and the affective domains, and whether they have distinct neural underpinnings and (iii) the consequences associated with a selective impairment of one of the two components, thereby addressing their importance in mental disorders such as autism spectrum disorders, psychopathy and alexithymia.     

支气管哮喘患者心理特征研究进展

支气管哮喘是全球范围内影响巨大的慢性气道炎症性呼吸道疾病,近年来随着空气污染的加剧和吸烟人数的增多,其发病率呈逐年上升的趋势,引起医学界越来越多的关注。支气管哮喘是由遗传因素、生物因素、心理因素等多种发病因素综合影响所致,随着研究的深入,有关心理因素对支气管哮喘的作用取得了重大的进展,其中支气管哮喘患者存在明显的人格特征和情绪障碍,并且患者特有的人格特征以及情绪障碍会对患者的病情和生活质量产生一定的影响。鉴于此,本文就支气管哮喘患者的性格特征、情绪特征以及其对疾病的影响进行简要阐述,以供临床参考。     

Does Work Affect Personality? A Study in Horses

It has been repeatedly hypothesized that job characteristics are related to changes in personality in humans, but often personality models still omit effects of life experience. Demonstrating reciprocal relationships between personality and work remains a challenge though, as in humans, many other influential factors may interfere. This study investigates this relationship by comparing the emotional reactivity of horses that differed only by their type of work. Horses are remarkable animal models to investigate this question as they share with humans working activities and their potential difficulties, such as "interpersonal" conflicts or "suppressed emotions". An earlier study showed that different types of work could be associated with different chronic behavioural disorders. Here, we hypothesised that type of work would affect horses' personality. Therefore over one hundred adult horses, differing only by their work characteristics were presented standardised behavioural tests. Subjects lived under the same conditions (same housing, same food), were of the same sex (geldings), and mostly one of two breeds, and had not been genetically selected for their current type of work. This is to our knowledge the first time that a direct relationship between type of work and personality traits has been investigated. Our results show that horses from different types of work differ not as much in their overall emotional levels as in the ways they express emotions (i.e. behavioural profile). Extremes were dressage horses, which presented the highest excitation components, and voltige horses, which were the quietest. The horses' type of work was decided by the stall managers, mostly on their jumping abilities, but unconscious choice based on individual behavioural characteristics cannot be totally excluded. Further research would require manipulating type of work. Our results nevertheless agree with reports on humans and suggest that more attention should be given to work characteristics when evaluating personalities.