Sebastian Moguilner
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The neural networks underlying the impact of emotion regulation on emotional intensity judgment
La empatía es necesaria en los tiempos actuales. Unos investigadores realizaron un interesante experimento para describir cuales son las redes neuronales subyacentes tanto en la regulacion del impacto emocional como en su apreciacion. Dando nuevas ideas para realizar experimentos en la neurociencia de las emociones.
emotional intensity judgment
Empathy represents a fundamental ability that allows for the creation and cultivation of social bonds (Social Interaction). As part of the empathic process, individuals use their own emotional state in order to interpret the content and valence of others' emotions (Cultural Neuroscience). One's own emotional state is influenced by the use of emotion regulation strategies (Motivation, Emotion & Craving).
In previous work, the researchers found a combined effect for empathy and emotion regulation on emotional intensity ratings; empathy for pain resulted in biased emotional intensity rating; and changing one's emotion via emotion regulation modulated these biased ratings (Naor, Sheppes, Shmay-Tsoory & Okon-Singer, 2018).
Crucially, the neural bases of emotion regulation (Etkin, Büchel & Gross, 2015) and empathy's (Preckel, Kanske, and Singer 2018) impact on cognition has been studied largely independently of one another. Hence, our understanding of the neural mechanisms behind their simultaneous contribution to cognitive-emotional ratings is incomplete.
In previous work, the researchers found a combined effect for empathy and emotion regulation on emotional intensity ratings; empathy for pain resulted in biased emotional intensity rating; and changing one's emotion via emotion regulation modulated these biased ratings (Naor, Sheppes, Shmay-Tsoory & Okon-Singer, 2018).
Crucially, the neural bases of emotion regulation (Etkin, Büchel & Gross, 2015) and empathy's (Preckel, Kanske, and Singer 2018) impact on cognition has been studied largely independently of one another. Hence, our understanding of the neural mechanisms behind their simultaneous contribution to cognitive-emotional ratings is incomplete.
Methods:
Thirty-three healthy volunteers participated in an fMRI (For MRI) experiment (1), following a procedure they describe elsewhere (Naor et al., 2018) and are outlined. in each trial participants were shown neutral or empathy evoking scenarios before being instructed which emotion regulation strategy do deploy. After the emotion elicitation phase, participants were shown emotional facial expressions and were asked to judge the intensity of the portrayed emotion.
emotion regulation
Results:
Behavioral– a greater bias was found for ratings of painful expressions. The bias for painful expressions was higher for the empathic watch than for reappraising conditions and higher for conditions that followed painful scenarios than for non-painful ones. All three conditions also interacted, so that the greatest bias was found for ratings of painful expressions made following the presentation of a painful scenario and implementation of the empathic watch.
Task– Activations during (A) ratings of painful expression following the reappraisal of painful scenario vs (B) ratings of painful expression following the reappraisal of the neutral scenario were contrasted with (C) ratings of painful expression following empathically watching painful scenario vs (D) ratings of painful expression following empathically watching neutral scenario [(A-B)-(C-D)]. The regulation of empathy via reappraisal of painful scenario was associated with increased activation in the rIFG. Whereas the use of empathic watch was associated with increased activation in the Precuneus , SMG, MFG, bilaterally, and the right Parahippocampal Gyrus.
PPI– A seed region in the Precuneus was used in order to explore the functional networks facilitating the regulation of emotion. To that end a conjunction analysis between the interaction of the seed and reappraisal trials and the seed and empathic watch trials was conducted. Both kinds of regulation strategies were associated with an increase in the functional connectivity between the rPrecuneus and the rSMG .
Task– Activations during (A) ratings of painful expression following the reappraisal of painful scenario vs (B) ratings of painful expression following the reappraisal of the neutral scenario were contrasted with (C) ratings of painful expression following empathically watching painful scenario vs (D) ratings of painful expression following empathically watching neutral scenario [(A-B)-(C-D)]. The regulation of empathy via reappraisal of painful scenario was associated with increased activation in the rIFG. Whereas the use of empathic watch was associated with increased activation in the Precuneus , SMG, MFG, bilaterally, and the right Parahippocampal Gyrus.
PPI– A seed region in the Precuneus was used in order to explore the functional networks facilitating the regulation of emotion. To that end a conjunction analysis between the interaction of the seed and reappraisal trials and the seed and empathic watch trials was conducted. Both kinds of regulation strategies were associated with an increase in the functional connectivity between the rPrecuneus and the rSMG .
Conclusions:
The behavioral results demonstrated the existence of cognitive bias in the ratings of painful expression as a result of empathy, and the ability of emotion regulation to mediate that bias. fMRI task results demonstrated that different regulation strategies rely on different brain region, as reappraisal was associated with increased IFG activations, while empathic watch was associated with increased activations in PCUN, MFG and SMG. Interestingly the rSMG has been implicated in overcoming egocentricity bias (Silani et al., 2013) through early regulation of the perceptual process. Our results suggest an additional role for the rSMG in the creation of accurate emotional understanding. Namely, through its connections with regions in the attentional network.
References
(1) Navot Naor, Lina Schaare, Christiane Rohr, Simone Shamay-Tsoory, Hadas Okon-Singer. (2019). The neural networks underlying the impact of emotion regulation on emotional intensity judgment(2) De Waal, F. B., & Preston, S. D. (2017). Mammalian empathy: behavioural manifestations and neural basis. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 18(8), 498.
(3) Etkin, A., Büchel, C., & Gross, J. J. (2015). The neural bases of emotion regulation. Nature reviews neuroscience, 16(11), 693.
(4) Gross, J. J. (2014). Emotion regulation: Conceptual and empirical foundations. Handbook of Emotion Regulation, 2, 3–20.
(5) Naor, N., Shamay-Tsoory, S. G., Sheppes, G., & Okon-Singer, H. (2018). The impact of empathy and reappraisal on emotional intensity recognition. Cognition and Emotion, 32(5), 972-987.
