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Are women better mindreaders? Sex differences in neural correlates of mentalizing detected with functional MRI
Open accessAbstract
BACKGROUND: The ability to mentalize, i.e. develop a Theory of Mind (ToM), enables us to anticipate and build a model of the thoughts, emotions and intentions of others. It has long been hypothesised that women differ from men in their mentalizing abilities. In the present fMRI study we examined the impact of (1) gender (women vs. men) and (2) game partner (human vs. computer) on ToM associated neural activity in the medial prefrontal cortex. Groups of men (n = 12) and women (n = 12) interacted in an iterated classical prisoner's dilemma forced choice situation with alleged human and computer partners who were outside the scanner. RESULTS: Both the conditions of playing against putative human as well as computer partners led to activity increases in mPFC, ACC and rTPJ, constituting the classic ToM network. However, mPFC/ACC activity was more pronounced when participants believed they were playing against the alleged human partner. Differences in the medial frontal lobe activation related to the sex of the participants could be demonstrated for the human partner > computer partner contrast. CONCLUSION: Our data demonstrate differences in medial prefrontal brain activation during a ToM task depending on both the gender of participants and the game partner.
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“Furthermore, studies of sex differences in social cognition have mainly focused on emotional expression perception and mental state reasoning with little emphasis placed on imitation (Krach et al., 2009;Russell, Tchanturia, Rahman, & Schmidt, 2007;Rahman, Wilson, & Abrahams, 2004;Campbell et al., 2002;Thayer & Johnsen, 2000).”
From Functional Specificity and Sex Differences in the Neural Circuits Supporting the Inhibition of Automatic Imitation (2018) · cites this paper as Krach et al., 2009
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Metadata
- Authors
- Krach, S., Blümel, I., Marjoram, D., Lataster, T., Krabbendam, L., Weber, J., van Os, J., & Kircher, T.
- Affiliations
- Philipps University of Marburg (DE)
- Universitätsklinikum Aachen (DE)
- University of Glasgow (GB)
- Maastricht University (NL)
- Columbia University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Krach, Sören
- Venue
- BMC Neuroscience
- Published
- 2009-02-04
- Volume
- 10
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 9-9
- ISSN
- 1471-2202 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC2667181
- OpenAlex
- W2031956151
- Cited by
- 101
- References
- 53
- Citations by year
- 2025: 4 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 9 · 2020: 8 · 2019: 3 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 9 · 2015: 6 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 7 · 2012: 8
- FWCI
- 11.13
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- BMC Neuroscience (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- VU Research Portal (publishedVersion, other-oa)
- Digital Academic REpository of VU University Amsterdam (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) (submittedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- RWTH Publications (RWTH Aachen) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Funders
- Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (01GW0751)
- RWTH Aachen University
- Medizinische Fakultät, RWTH Aachen University
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Action Observation and Synchronization
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Face Recognition and Perception
- Keywords
- theory of mind, mentalization, sex differences, gender differences, medial prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, right temporoparietal junction, human-computer interaction, iterated prisoner's dilemma, social cognition, neural correlates
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Analysis of Variance, Brain, Brain Mapping, Female, Humans, Interpersonal Relations, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Mental Processes, Surveys and Questionnaires, Reaction Time, Sex Characteristics, Social Perception, User-Computer Interface, Young Adult
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