Department of Anthropology, Emory University, 207 Anthropology Building, 1557 Dickey Drive, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA.
Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2013 Jan;8(1):48-55. doi: 10.1093/scan/nss095. Epub 2012 Sep 5.
The ability to accurately infer others' mental states from facial expressions is important for optimal social functioning and is fundamentally impaired in social cognitive disorders such as autism. While pharmacologic interventions have shown promise for enhancing empathic accuracy, little is known about the effects of behavioral interventions on empathic accuracy and related brain activity. This study employed a randomized, controlled and longitudinal design to investigate the effect of a secularized analytical compassion meditation program, cognitive-based compassion training (CBCT), on empathic accuracy. Twenty-one healthy participants received functional MRI scans while completing an empathic accuracy task, the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET), both prior to and after completion of either CBCT or a health discussion control group. Upon completion of the study interventions, participants randomized to CBCT and were significantly more likely than control subjects to have increased scores on the RMET and increased neural activity in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC). Moreover, changes in dmPFC and IFG activity from baseline to the post-intervention assessment were associated with changes in empathic accuracy. These findings suggest that CBCT may hold promise as a behavioral intervention for enhancing empathic accuracy and the neurobiology supporting it.
从面部表情准确推断他人心理状态的能力对于最佳社交功能至关重要，而在自闭症等社会认知障碍中则严重受损。虽然药物干预已显示出增强同理心准确性的潜力，但对于行为干预对同理心准确性和相关大脑活动的影响知之甚少。本研究采用随机、对照和纵向设计，调查了一种世俗化的分析性怜悯冥想方案——基于认知的怜悯训练（CBCT）对同理心准确性的影响。21 名健康参与者在完成同理心准确性任务——“读心测试”（RMET）之前和之后，分别接受了功能磁共振成像扫描，然后完成了 CBCT 或健康讨论对照组。在完成研究干预后，与对照组相比，接受 CBCT 的参与者在 RMET 上的得分明显更高，并且在额下回（IFG）和背内侧前额叶皮层（dmPFC）中的神经活动增加。此外，从基线到干预后评估，dmPFC 和 IFG 活动的变化与同理心准确性的变化相关。这些发现表明，CBCT 可能作为一种增强同理心准确性及其支持神经生物学的行为干预方法具有潜力。
