Mattan Bradley D, Rotshtein Pia, Quinn Kimberly A
a School of Psychology , University of Birmingham , Birmingham , UK.
b Department of Psychology , DePaul University , Chicago , USA.
Cogn Neurosci. 2016 Jan-Oct;7(1-4):170-81. doi: 10.1080/17588928.2015.1085372. Epub 2016 Jan 8.
This study examined the extent to which visual perspective-taking performance is modulated by trait-level empathy. Participants completed a third-person visual perspective-taking task in which they judged the perspectives of two simultaneously presented avatars, designated "Self" and "Other." Depending on the trial, these avatars either held the same view (i.e., congruent) or a different view (i.e., incongruent). Analyses focused on the relationship between empathy and two perspective-taking phenomena: Selection between competing perspectives (i.e., perspective-congruence effects) and prioritization of the Self avatar's perspective. Empathy was related to improved overall performance on this task and a reduced cost of selecting between conflicting perspectives (i.e., smaller perspective-congruence effects). This effect was asymmetric, with empathy (i.e., empathic concern) levels predicting reduced interference from a conflicting perspective, especially when adopting the Self (vs. Other) avatar's perspective. Taken together, these results highlight the importance of the self-other distinction and mental flexibility components of empathy.
本研究考察了特质水平的共情对视觉换位思考表现的调节程度。参与者完成了一项第三人称视觉换位思考任务，在该任务中，他们判断两个同时呈现的虚拟形象（分别指定为“自我”和“他人”）的视角。根据试验情况，这些虚拟形象要么持有相同观点（即一致），要么持有不同观点（即不一致）。分析聚焦于共情与两种换位思考现象之间的关系：在相互竞争的视角之间进行选择（即视角一致性效应）以及对自我虚拟形象视角的优先化。共情与该任务的整体表现改善以及在冲突视角之间进行选择的成本降低（即较小的视角一致性效应）相关。这种效应是不对称的，共情（即共情关注）水平预示着来自冲突视角的干扰减少，尤其是在采用自我（相对于他人）虚拟形象的视角时。综上所述，这些结果凸显了共情中自我 - 他人区分和心理灵活性成分的重要性。
