School of Psychology, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston B15 2TT, UK.
Pain. 2010 Feb;148(2):268-274. doi: 10.1016/j.pain.2009.11.007. Epub 2009 Dec 11.
Observing someone else in pain produces a shared emotional experience that predominantly activates brain areas processing the emotional component of pain. Occasionally, however, sensory areas are also activated and there are anecdotal reports of people sharing both the somatic and emotional components of someone else's pain. Here we presented a series of images or short clips depicting noxious events to a large group of normal controls. Approximately one-third of this sample reported an actual noxious somatic experience in response to one or more of the images or clips. Ten of these pain responders were subsequently recruited and matched with 10 non-responders to take part in an fMRI study. The subjects were scanned while observing static images of noxious events. In contrast with emotional images not containing noxious events the responders activated emotional and sensory brain regions associated with pain while the non-responders activated very little. These findings provide convincing evidence that some people can readily experience both the emotional and sensory components of pain during observation of other's pain resulting in a shared physical pain experience.
观察他人的痛苦会产生一种共同的情感体验，这种体验主要激活大脑中处理疼痛情感成分的区域。然而，偶尔也会激活感觉区域，并且有一些传闻报道称，有些人会共同体验到他人疼痛的躯体和情感成分。在这里，我们向一大群正常对照组展示了一系列描绘有害事件的图像或短片。大约三分之一的样本对一个或多个图像或短片报告了实际的有害躯体体验。这 10 名疼痛反应者随后被招募，并与 10 名非反应者配对，参与 fMRI 研究。当观察到有害事件的静态图像时，对受试者进行了扫描。与不包含有害事件的情感图像相比，反应者激活了与疼痛相关的情感和感觉大脑区域，而非反应者则很少激活。这些发现提供了令人信服的证据，表明有些人在观察他人的疼痛时，很容易同时体验到疼痛的情感和感觉成分，从而产生共同的身体疼痛体验。
