Yesudas Esther H, Lee Tatia M C
Laboratory of Neuropsychology, The University of Hong Kong, Room 656, The Jockey Club Tower, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong ; Laboratory of Social Cognitive Affective Neuroscience, The University of Hong Kong, Room 656, The Jockey Club Tower, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong.
Laboratory of Neuropsychology, The University of Hong Kong, Room 656, The Jockey Club Tower, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong ; Laboratory of Social Cognitive Affective Neuroscience, The University of Hong Kong, Room 656, The Jockey Club Tower, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong ; The State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, The University of Hong Kong, Room 656, The Jockey Club Tower, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong ; Institute of Clinical Neuropsychology, The University of Hong Kong, Room 656, The Jockey Club Tower, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong.
Biomed Res Int. 2015;2015:719615. doi: 10.1155/2015/719615. Epub 2015 Feb 26.
Vicarious pain is defined as the observation of individuals in pain. There is growing neuroimaging evidence suggesting that the cingulate cortex plays a significant role in self-experienced pain processing. Yet, very few studies have directly tested the distinct functions of the cingulate cortex for vicarious pain. In this review, one EEG and eighteen neuroimaging studies reporting cingulate cortex activity during pain observation were discussed. The data indicate that there is overlapping neural activity in the cingulate cortex during self- and vicarious pain. Such activity may contribute to shared neural pain representations that permit inference of the affective state of individuals in pain, facilitating empathy. However, the exact location of neuronal populations in which activity overlaps or differs for self- and observed pain processing requires further confirmation. This review also discusses evidence suggesting differential functions of the cingulate cortex in cognitive, affective, and motor processing during empathy induction. While affective processing in the cingulate cortex during pain observation has been explored relatively more often, its attention and motor roles remain underresearched. Shedding light on the neural correlates of vicarious pain and corresponding empathy in healthy populations can provide neurobiological markers and intervention targets for empathic deficits found in various clinical disorders.
替代性疼痛被定义为对处于疼痛中的个体的观察。越来越多的神经影像学证据表明，扣带回皮质在自我体验的疼痛处理中发挥着重要作用。然而，很少有研究直接测试扣带回皮质在替代性疼痛中的不同功能。在这篇综述中，讨论了一项脑电图研究和18项报告疼痛观察期间扣带回皮质活动的神经影像学研究。数据表明，在自我疼痛和替代性疼痛期间，扣带回皮质存在重叠的神经活动。这种活动可能有助于形成共享的神经疼痛表征，从而能够推断出疼痛个体的情感状态，促进同理心。然而，自我疼痛处理和观察到的疼痛处理中活动重叠或不同的神经元群体的确切位置需要进一步证实。这篇综述还讨论了证据，这些证据表明在同理心诱导过程中，扣带回皮质在认知、情感和运动处理方面具有不同的功能。虽然在疼痛观察期间对扣带回皮质中的情感处理进行了相对较多的探索，但其注意力和运动作用仍未得到充分研究。阐明健康人群中替代性疼痛和相应同理心的神经关联，可以为各种临床疾病中发现的同理心缺陷提供神经生物学标志物和干预靶点。
