Mathur Vani A, Cheon Bobby K, Harada Tokiko, Scimeca Jason M, Chiao Joan Y
Department of Psychology, Northwestern University, 2029 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208, USA; Department of Psychology, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843-4235, USA.
Department of Psychology, Northwestern University, 2029 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208, USA; Division of Psychology Nanyang Technological University and Clinical Nutrition Research Center, Singapore Institute for Clinical Sciences (A⁎Star), Singapore.
Neuropsychologia. 2016 Jan 29;81:265-273. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.12.025. Epub 2015 Dec 28.
Interpersonal pain perception is a fundamental and evolutionarily beneficial social process. While critical for navigating the social world, whether or not people rely on similar processes to perceive and respond to the harm of the non-human biological world remains largely unknown. Here we investigate whether neural reactivity toward the suffering of other people is distinct from or overlapping with the neural response to pain and harm inflicted upon non-human entities, specifically animals and nature. We used fMRI to measure neural activity while participants (n=15) perceived and reported how badly they felt for the pain or harm of humans, animals, and nature, relative to neutral situations. Neural regions associated with perceiving the pain of other people (e.g. dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, bilateral anterior insula) were similarly recruited when perceiving and responding to painful scenes across people, animals, and nature. These results suggest that similar brain responses are relied upon when perceiving the harm of social and non-social biological entities, broadly construed, and that activity within the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and bilateral anterior insula in response to pain-relevant stimuli is not uniquely specific to humans.
人际间的疼痛感知是一个基本且具有进化益处的社会过程。虽然这对于在社会世界中生存至关重要，但人们是否依靠类似的过程来感知和应对非人类生物世界的伤害在很大程度上仍不为人知。在这里，我们研究对他人痛苦的神经反应是否与对非人类实体（特别是动物和自然）所遭受的疼痛和伤害的神经反应不同或重叠。我们使用功能磁共振成像（fMRI）来测量神经活动，同时参与者（n = 15）感知并报告相对于中性情境，他们对人类、动物和自然的疼痛或伤害感到多么难受。当感知并回应涉及人、动物和自然的痛苦场景时，与感知他人疼痛相关的神经区域（例如背侧前扣带回皮层、双侧前脑岛）被类似地激活。这些结果表明，在感知广义上的社会和非社会生物实体的伤害时，人们依靠类似的大脑反应，并且背侧前扣带回皮层和双侧前脑岛对与疼痛相关刺激的反应活动并非人类所特有。
