Elsevier

Neuroscience Letters

Volume 693, 6 February 2019, Pages 49-53
Neuroscience Letters

Review article
Imaging empathy and prosocial emotions

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neulet.2017.06.054Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Empathy is a multi-faceted construct.

  • Affect sharing, self-other distinction, compassion, prosocial behavior are distinct phenomena.

  • These phenomena differ with respect to their neural mechanisms.

  • Progress in their understanding requires an integrative approach.

Abstract

Empathy is a multi-faceted construct with important implications for social behavior. Based on a selective review of the neuroscientific evidence collected in humans, the present paper discusses the neural representations underlying affect sharing, its relation to mentalizing, the importance of self-other distinction, the distinction between empathy, sympathy and compassion, and how these phenomena are linked to prosocial behavior. Apart from reviewing the literature, we also highlight open questions and how they might be addressed by a research approach that tries to integrate across these diverse constructs.

Section snippets

Empathy – a multi-faceted construct

While many different definitions of empathy exist [1][1 for a review], the one proposed in [2] highlights several aspects on which we will focus on in this paper, which are affect sharing, mentalizing, self-other distinction, sympathy and compassion, and prosocial behavior. More specifically, according to this definition, empathy encompasses the isomorphic sharing of the affective state of another person (affect sharing); which can be triggered by direct observation, but also the mere

Affect sharing and “shared representations”

A great deal of neuroscientific research on empathy has focused on affect sharing. One influential view, the so-called “shared representations account of empathy”, suggests that empathy for a certain emotion engages neural processes that also underpin the first-hand experience of that emotion [6], [7]. This account was initially fueled by the robust finding that empathy for pain activates mid-cingulate and anterior insular cortices – i.e., areas that are also activated when pain is experienced

Self-other distinction

Self-other distinction is important to avoid that our feelings bias how accurately we share and understand another person’s affective state [32]. A lack of self-other distinction can have deleterious effects on prosocial behavior, as its failure may increase personal distress, a self-related aversive response detracting the focus on our partner’s suffering towards our own distress and its regulation [3]. One area with which self-other distinction has consistently been associated with is the

Sympathy and compassion

On a conceptual level, empathy and sympathy (or the related terms of care and compassion) should be regarded as distinct phenomena [see 4 for in-depth discussion]. The requirement of this distinction has recently become obvious again in a controversy on how empathy is related to morality, which may partially be resolved by differences in the use of the terms “empathy” and “compassion” by different scholars [13], [41], [42]. Based on neural data, we have been gaining an increasingly detailed

Prosocial behavior

What motivates prosocial behavior certainly bears the strongest potential implications that neuroscientific research on social emotions might have. After all, we do not only want to know what makes us share and understand the feelings of others, but also how this motivates us to behave towards others. One particularly interesting trend in the literature is the use of computational models to formally explain behavior [52], [53], [54]. For instance, [52] modelled fMRI data during reinforcement

Conclusion

Empathy is a highly complex and multi-faceted phenomenon that has fascinated scholars of various disciplines for centuries. It also attracts enormous interest by the general public, due to the implications it may have to address the major societal and political challenges we are currently facing. While having provided some major first insights, the neuroscientific investigation of this phenomenon is still in its infancy. By focusing on the many facets of empathy and its effects on social

Acknowledgments

The authors received financial support from the Austrian Science Fund [grant number P29150], and the Federal Ministry of Science, Research & Economy [grant name: “Interdisciplinary Translational Brain Research Cluster with Highfield MR”].

References (60)

  • A. Wood et al.

    Fashioning the face: sensorimotor simulation contributes to facial expression recognition

    Trends Cogn. Sci.

    (2016)
  • J. Zaki et al.

    The anatomy of suffering: understanding the relationship between nociceptive and empathic pain

    Trends Cogn. Sci.

    (2016)
  • R.M. Carter et al.

    A nexus model of the temporal-parietal junction

    Trends Cogn. Sci.

    (2013)
  • I. Santiesteban et al.

    Enhancing social ability by stimulating right temporoparietal junction

    Curr. Biol.

    (2012)
  • M. Schurz et al.

    Fractionating theory of mind: a meta-analysis of functional brain imaging studies

    Neurosci. Biobehav. R.

    (2014)
  • J.J. Geng et al.

    Re-evaluating the role of TPJ in attentional control: contextual updating?

    Neurosci. Biobehav. R.

    (2013)
  • P. Bloom

    Empathy, schmempathy response to Zaki

    Trends Cogn. Sci.

    (2017)
  • J. Zaki

    Moving beyond stereotypes of empathy

    Trends Cogn. Sci.

    (2017)
  • A. Lutz et al.

    BOLD signal in insula is differentially related to cardiac function during compassion meditation in experts vs. novices

    Neuroimage

    (2009)
  • T. Singer et al.

    Empathy and compassion

    Curr. Biol.

    (2014)
  • Y.W. Cheng et al.

    Expertise modulates the perception of pain in others

    Curr. Biol.

    (2007)
  • Y. Morishima et al.

    Linking brain structure and activation in temporoparietal junction to explain the neurobiology of human altruism

    Neuron

    (2012)
  • G. Hein et al.

    Neural responses to ingroup and outgroup members' suffering predict individual differences in costly helping

    Neuron

    (2010)
  • O. FeldmanHall et al.

    Empathic concern drives costly altruism

    Neuroimage

    (2015)
  • J. Majdandzic et al.

    The selfless mind: how prefrontal involvement in mentalizing with similar and dissimilar others shapes empathy and prosocial behavior

    Cognition

    (2016)
  • M. Zanon et al.

    Brain activity and prosocial behavior in a simulated life-threatening situation

    Neuroimage

    (2014)
  • J. Decety et al.

    The complex relation between morality and empathy

    Trends Cogn. Sci.

    (2014)
  • C.D. Batson

    These things called empathy

  • J. Decety et al.

    Empathy vs. personal distress

  • T. Singer et al.

    The social neuroscience of empathy

    Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci.

    (2009)
  • Cited by (104)

    View all citing articles on Scopus
    View full text