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Empathy circuit
The
Empathy Circuit
Chapter in 'Zero Degrees of Empathy'
Simon
Baron-Cohen
Baron-Cohen identifies at least ten related brain areas involved in
empathy,
which he refers to as the 'empathy circuit'. The medial prefrontal
cortex
(MPFC) is highlighted as a hub for social information, and the area in
which
our own perspective on events can be compared to that of others. The
dorsal
part of this region is involved in thinking about other people's
thoughts and
feelings in conjunction with our own. In contrast, the ventral part of
this
region is more concerned with our own thoughts. Damasio has suggested
that this
region can store a record of the emotional valence of prior causes of
action,
positive for actions that turned out to be rewarding and negative for
actions
there were punishing. It has been shown that damage to this area of the
brain
can reduce empathy.
The ventral medial prefrontal overlaps with the
orbitofrontal cortex also identified as part of the empathy circuit.
Patients
with orbitofrontal damage may have difficulty with judging social
behaviour,
which is seen as indicative of a lack of empathy. These observations
about the
orbitofrontal might be seen as linking empathy to the functioning of
subjective
consciousness, since it has been shown the activation in the
orbitofrontal can
correlate to appreciation of the subjective experience rather than
strength of
signal.
The orbitofrontal is close to the frontal operculum, which
may be
involved in assessing the intentions of others, and this in turn is
close to
the inferior frontal gyrus involved in the visual recognition of
emotions. This
connects to the inferior parietal lobe, part of the mirror neuron
system, which
reacts when observing actions in both ourselves and others. Further to
this, the
middle cingulate cortex is involved in the experience of pain in oneself
and in
others, while the anterior insula is connected to empathy via awareness
of the
body.
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