Department of Psychology and Logopedics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Helsinki, Finland.
Brain and Mind Laboratory, Department of Neuroscience and Biomedical Engineering, Aalto University School of Science, Espoo, Finland; International Laboratory of Social Neurobiology, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russian Federation.
Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2021 Dec;131:1214-1227. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2021.10.027. Epub 2021 Oct 29.
In-group favoritism and prejudices relate to discriminatory behaviors but, despite decades of research, understanding of their neural correlates has been limited. A systematic coordinate-based meta-analysis of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies (altogether 87 original datasets, n = 2328) was conducted to investigate neural inter-group biases, i.e., responses toward in-group vs. out-group in different contexts. We found inter-group biases in some previously identified brain regions (e.g., the medial prefrontal cortex, insula) but also in many previously non-identified brain regions (e.g., the cerebellum, precentral gyrus). Sub-group analyses indicated that neural correlates of inter-group biases may be mostly context-specific. Regarding different types of group memberships, inter-group bias toward trivial groups was evident only in the cingulate cortex, while inter-group biases toward "real" groups (ethnic, national, or political groups) involved broader sets of brain regions. Additionally, there were heightened neural threat responses toward out-groups' faces and stronger neural empathic responses toward in-groups' suffering. We did not obtain significant publication bias. Overall, the findings provide novel implications for theory and prejudice-reduction interventions.
群体内偏爱和偏见与歧视行为有关，但尽管已经进行了几十年的研究，其神经相关性的理解仍很有限。对功能磁共振成像(fMRI)研究进行了系统的基于坐标的荟萃分析(总共 87 个原始数据集，n = 2328)，以研究神经间群体偏见，即不同情境下对内群体与外群体的反应。我们发现了一些先前确定的大脑区域(例如，内侧前额叶皮层、脑岛)存在间群体偏见，但也发现了许多先前未确定的大脑区域(例如，小脑、中央前回)存在间群体偏见。亚组分析表明，间群体偏见的神经相关性可能主要是特定于情境的。关于不同类型的群体归属，只有在扣带回皮层中才存在对琐碎群体的群体间偏见，而对“真实”群体(种族、民族或政治群体)的群体间偏见则涉及更广泛的大脑区域。此外，对外群体的面孔存在更高的神经威胁反应，对内群体的痛苦存在更强的神经共情反应。我们没有发现显著的发表偏倚。总的来说，这些发现为理论和减少偏见的干预措施提供了新的启示。
