Summary of Jean Decety’s The Neuroevolution of EmpathyBY: JEN RUIZ

Defining Empathy

Empathy: feelings of concern for others, experiencing emotion that match another individuals, knowing what others are thinking/feeling, or blurring the line between self and others.

Three components to empathy

Affective

Cognitive

Behavioral

*Due to this complexity, it is difficult to measure all components

of empathy in the same study.

Human Empathy

Not restricted to kin Does not require prompting by actual

perception of distress or emotional contagion

Can extend to strangers and across species

Empathy is not limited to the cortex, but includes the brainstem, ANS, hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, and the endocrine system

Key Concepts

Examination of how empathy evolved in the context of parental care in mammals

Neurological mechanisms that underlie empathy

Neurological Mechanisms

For basis affective states, are homologous in all mammals (genetically hardwired)

Evolved for differentiating hostile vs hospitable stimuli and organizing the adaptive response

Architecture maps onto neural circuitry of the limbic system: hypothalamus, parahippocampal cortex, amygdala, and inter-connected areas (septum, basal ganglia, nucleus accumbens, anterior insular cortex, and retrospenial cingulate cortex)

Limbic regions then project to the orbitofrontal and anterior cingulate cortex for evaluation of emotion as well as decision-making

Evidence for partial independent circuitry for positive or negative stimuli, supported by opposing roles of DA and Ach in the striatum for GABA output (avoidance or approach)

Basic affect circuits emerge earlier than higher cognitive function

Social species care for offspring longer need to respond to

emotional expression of hunger, pain, distress, or fear

Presence of some aspects of empathy in other mammals

Mammalian Parental Care

The nucleus accumbens is critical for attachment and maternal behavior

Neuropeptides like oxytocin, opiods, and prolactin, regulate empathetic responsiveness

Oxytocin facilitates maternal behavior, increases prosocial behavior, and reduces activity in areas associated with separation anxiety

OC nasal spray reduces social stress, can increase mutual trust, reduces amygdala activity and modulates its coupling brainstem regions involved in fear, and contributes to detection of facial expression.

Attachment security leads to more empathetic responses

Pain not only warns but attract attention

Mice study: Females will approach a familiar female in pain more often than a familiar female or a strange female in pain

Mother’s listening to crying babies show increased activity in the medial thalamus, insula, ACC, and OFC as well as rodent maternal structures like the midbrain, hypothalamus, striatum, and lateral septum

fMRI Studies

o Pain circuit is also emulated anticipation, perception or imagination

o Activation of te anterior insular cortex serve to compute a higher order meta-representation

• Plays a role in learning and adaptation of prosocial behavior, guiding decision-making

• To be motivated to help another, one needs to be empathetically aroused

o Empathetic response is more sensitive to:

• Loved ones

• Circumstances surrounding pain

• Prior interactions

• Ethnic groups

• Knowledge and experience of pain

Knowledge and Experience With Pain

Neuroimaging study Subjects shown videos of others

being pricked by needles

Controls show activation of pain matrix

Physicians show activation of cortical regions for executive functions and attention, no activation of pain matrix

Event-related potientials Same conditions

Controls show early response to pain/no pain differentiation

No ERP response for physicians

Frees up cognitive resources for being of assistance

Can Empathy Be Selfish?

Reinforcement by the DA system to the nucleus accumbens

Feedback from others

Reward network engaged when receiving monetary reward or voluntary donation of money

Presence of observers increases donation rates and significantly affects activity in striatal regions

How does this relate to Haidt?

The concept that evolution has hardwired us with mechanisms for basic empathy. The basic mechanisms have been built upon, evolving into much more complex circuits that are plastic and subject to individual environment and experience.