Empathy: shared circuits and their dysfunctions
Open accessAbstract
Observing another individual acting upon an object triggers cerebral activity well beyond the visual cortex of the observer in areas directly involved in planning and executing actions. This we will call action simulation. Importantly, the brain does not solely simulate the actions of others but also the sensations they feel, and their emotional responses. These simulation mechanisms are most active in individuals who report being very empathic. Simulation may indeed be instrumental for our understanding of the emotional and mental state of people in our sight, and may contribute heavily to the social interactions with our peers by providing a first-person perspective on their inner feelings. Simulation mechanisms are at work at an early stage of social development and might be defective in young individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). However, the results to date regarding ASD are not clearcut, and an equal number of studies report positive and negative findings.
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Abnormalities in emotion recognition are central to several psychiatric conditions including ASD, in which OTR polymorphisms and insular cortex hypofunction are correlates of symptom severity.
“Abnormalities in emotion recognition are central to several psychiatric conditions including ASD47,48, in which OTR polymorphisms49,50 and insular cortex hypofunction8,9 are correlates of symptom severity.”
From Insular cortex mediates approach and avoidance responses to social affective stimuli (2018) · cites this paper as [48]
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(2022) · לקסי-קיי · doi:10.54301/ggoc7625
- Authors
- Thioux, M., & Keysers, C.
- Affiliations
- Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience (NL)
- Corresponding author
- Thioux, Marc
- Venue
- Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2010-12-31
- Volume
- 12
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 546-552
- ISSN
- 1294-8322 (ISSN-L)
- 1958-5969
- PMC
- PMC3181990
- OpenAlex
- W4327671828
- Cited by
- 21
- References
- 63
- Citations by year
- 2023: 2 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 2 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 1 · 2016: 1 · 2015: 1 · 2014: 2 · 2013: 2 · 2012: 2
- FWCI
- 1.75
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- diamond
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- KNAW Research Portal (The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- PubMed
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Action Observation and Synchronization
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Autism Spectrum Disorder Research
- Keywords
- empathy, action simulation, mirror neuron system, emotional simulation, autism spectrum disorder, social cognition, social development (developmental psychology), neural circuits, theory of mind
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Autistic Disorder, Brain, Brain Mapping, Empathy, Humans, Neural Pathways, Pain
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