The Experts below are selected from a list of 276 Experts worldwide ranked by ideXlab platform
Tania Singer - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Socioaffective versus sociocognitive mental trainings differentially affect emotion regulation strategies.
Emotion, 2018Co-Authors: Lea K. Hildebrandt, Cade Mccall, Tania SingerAbstract:A variety of contemplative practices putatively improves the ability to deal with difficult emotions. However, it is unclear how these different types of mental training differentially affect the use of different emotion regulation strategies. We addressed this question in a 9-month longitudinal study in which participants (N = 332) took part in three distinct 3-month mental training modules cultivating attentional (the Presence module), sociocognitive (the Perspective module), and socioaffective, compassion-based skills (the Affect module). In addition, the participants completed the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire and the Brief COPE Inventory at baseline and after every module. The Presence module did not notably change the use of any emotion regulation strategies, whereas the Perspective and the Affect modules both increased the use of acceptance. Moreover, the Perspective module was especially effective in increasing the use of adaptive, cognitive transformations such as reappraisal, perspective Taking, and planning, whereas the Affect module uniquely led to decreases in maladaptive avoidant strategies such as distraction and refocusing. These findings imply that (a) cultivating present-moment focused attention might not be sufficient to change emotion regulation strategies, (b) different types of mental practices focusing on either cognitive perspective Taking or sociomotivational capacities lead to adaptive emotion regulation via different strategies, and (c) specifically cultivating positive affect and compassion can decrease avoidance of difficult emotions. This research suggests that different mental training exercises affect the use of specific emotion regulation strategies and that clinical interventions should be designed accordingly. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
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Structural plasticity of the social brain: Differential change after socio-affective and cognitive mental training
Science Advances, 2017Co-Authors: Sofie L. Valk, Nicolas Guizard, D. Louis Collins, Fynn-mathis Trautwein, Philipp Kanske, Anne Böckler, Boris C Bernhardt, Tania SingerAbstract:Although neuroscientific research has revealed experience-dependent brain changes across the life span in sensory, motor, and cognitive domains, plasticity relating to social capacities remains largely unknown. To investigate whether the targeted mental training of different cognitive and social skills can induce specific changes in brain morphology, we collected longitudinal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data throughout a 9-month mental training intervention from a large sample of adults between 20 and 55 years of age. By means of various daily mental exercises and weekly instructed group sessions, training protocols specifically addressed three functional domains: (i) mindfulness-based attention and interoception, (ii) socio-affective skills (compassion, dealing with difficult emotions, and prosocial motivation), and (iii) socio-cognitive skills (cognitive perspective-Taking on self and others and metacognition). MRI-based cortical thickness analyses, contrasting the different training modules against each other, indicated spatially diverging changes in cortical morphology. Training of present-moment focused attention mostly led to increases in cortical thickness in prefrontal regions, socio-affective training induced plasticity in frontoinsular regions, and socio-cognitive training included change in inferior frontal and lateral temporal cortices. Module-specific structural brain changes correlated with training-induced behavioral improvements in the same individuals in domain-specific measures of attention, compassion, and cognitive perspective-Taking, respectively, and overlapped with task-relevant functional networks. Our longitudinal findings indicate structural plasticity in well-known socio-affective and socio-cognitive brain networks in healthy adults based on targeted short daily mental practices. These findings could promote the development of evidence-based mental training interventions in clinical, educational, and corporate settings aimed at cultivating social intelligence, prosocial motivation, and cooperation.
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Substrates of metacognition on perception and metacognition on higher-order cognition relate to different subsystems of the mentalizing network
Human Brain Mapping, 2016Co-Authors: Sofie L. Valk, Philipp Kanske, Anne Böckler, Boris C Bernhardt, Tania SingerAbstract:Humans have the ability to reflect upon their perception, thoughts, and actions, known as metacognition (MC). The brain basis of MC is incompletely understood, and it is debated whether MC on different processes is subserved by common or divergent networks. We combined behavioral phenotyping with multi-modal neuroimaging to investigate whether structural substrates of individual differences in MC on higher-order cognition (MC-C) are dissociable from those underlying MC on perceptual accuracy (MC-P). Motivated by conceptual work suggesting a link between MC and cognitive perspective Taking, we furthermore tested for overlaps between MC substrates and mentalizing networks. In a large sample of healthy adults, individual differences in MC-C and MC-P did not correlate. MRI-based cortical thickness mapping revealed a structural basis of this independence, by showing that individual differences in MC-P related to right prefrontal cortical thickness, while MC-C scores correlated with measures in lateral prefrontal, temporo-parietal, and posterior midline regions. Surface-based superficial white matter diffusivity analysis revealed substrates resembling those seen for cortical thickness, confirming the divergence of both MC faculties using an independent imaging marker. Despite their specificity, substrates of MC-C and MC-P fell clearly within networks known to participate in mentalizing, confirmed by task-based fMRI in the same subjects, previous meta-analytical findings, and ad-hoc Neurosynth-based meta-analyses. Our integrative multi-method approach indicates domain-specific substrates of MC; despite their divergence, these nevertheless likely rely on component processes mediated by circuits also involved in mentalizing. Hum Brain Mapp 37:3388-3399, 2016. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
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Decoding the charitable brain: Empathy, perspective Taking and attention shifts differentially predict altruistic giving
The Journal of Neuroscience, 2016Co-Authors: Anita Tusche, Fynn-mathis Trautwein, Philipp Kanske, Anne Böckler, Tania SingerAbstract:Altruistic behavior varies considerably across people and decision contexts. The relevant computational and motivational mechanisms that underlie its heterogeneity, however, are poorly understood. Using a charitable giving task together with multivariate decoding techniques, we identified three distinct psychological mechanisms underlying altruistic decision-making (empathy, perspective Taking, and attentional reorienting) and linked them to dissociable neural computations. Neural responses in the anterior insula (AI) (but not temporoparietal junction [TPJ]) encoded trial-wise empathy for beneficiaries, whereas the TPJ (but not AI) predicted the degree of perspective Taking. Importantly, the relative influence of both socio-cognitive processes differed across individuals: participants whose donation behavior was heavily influenced by affective empathy exhibited higher predictive accuracies for generosity in AI, whereas those who strongly relied on cognitive perspective Taking showed improved predictions of generous donations in TPJ. Furthermore, subject-specific contributions of both processes for donations were reflected in participants' empathy and perspective Taking responses in a separate fMRI task (EmpaToM), suggesting that process-specific inputs into altruistic choices may reflect participants' general propensity to either empathize or mentalize. Finally, using independent attention task data, we identified shared neural codes for attentional reorienting and generous donations in the posterior superior temporal sulcus, suggesting that domain-general attention shifts also contribute to generous behavior (but not in TPJ or AI). Overall, our findings demonstrate highly specific roles of AI for affective empathy and TPJ for cognitive perspective Taking as precursors of prosocial behavior and suggest that these discrete routes of social cognition differentially drive intraindividual and interindividual differences in altruistic behavior.
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Empathy and compassion
Current Biology, 2014Co-Authors: Tania Singer, Olga M. KlimeckiAbstract:As humans we are a highly social species: in order to coordinate our joint actions and assure successful communication, we use language skills to explicitly convey information to each other, and social abilities such as empathy or perspective Taking to infer another person's emotions and mental state. The human cognitive capacity to draw inferences about other peoples' beliefs, intentions and thoughts has been termed mentalizing, theory of mind or cognitive perspective Taking. This capacity makes it possible, for instance, to understand that people may have views that differ from our own. Conversely, the capacity to share the feelings of others is called empathy. Empathy makes it possible to resonate with others' positive and negative feelings alike - we can thus feel happy when we vicariously share the joy of others and we can share the experience of suffering when we empathize with someone in pain. Importantly, in empathy one feels with someone, but one does not confuse oneself with the other; that is, one still knows that the emotion one resonates with is the emotion of another. If this self-other distinction is not present, we speak of emotion contagion, a precursor of empathy that is already present in babies.
Jaskaran Basran - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Measuring competitive self-focus perspective Taking, submissive compassion and compassion goals
Journal of Compassionate Health Care, 2017Co-Authors: Paul Gilbert, Francisca Catarino, Joana Sousa, Laura Ceresatto, Rosalind Moore, Jaskaran BasranAbstract:Background Research in the last 20 years has provided good evidence that developing compassion-focused motives for self and others has a range of benefits. However, people can behave in prosocial ways for different reasons, not all of which are genuinely care focused. This paper reports research comparing submissive compassion (being helpful to be liked) to “genuine” compassion in relation to domains of empathy and perspective Taking. We developed a new short (5 item) self-report scale (the competitive perspective Taking scale) to explore how people might use perspective Taking for self-focused reasons. We investigated its association with validated empathy and compassion measures. Methods One hundred ninety nine students completed a range of questionnaires including a new short (5 item) self-report scale ‘The Competitive Perspective Taking Scale’ online or on paper at the end of lectures or during lecture breaks. Results Compassionate goals were positively correlated with the empathy quotient and its subscales. However, submissive compassion had a small negative correlation with the social skills subscale on the empathy quotient and was unrelated to other subscales. In addition, submissive compassion, unlike compassionate goals, was associated with submissive behaviour, shame, self-criticism, depression, anxiety and stress. Competitive perspective Taking was positively correlated with cognitive empathy on the emotional quotient but not emotional reactivity or social skills. Conclusion These findings indicate there are individual differences in compassion motivation and the competencies of compassion, such as empathy and that these should be measured separately. In addition, the findings suggests that the higher peoples cognitive perspective Taking, the more they are able to recognise their ability to use empathy for beneficial reasons.
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Measuring competitive self-focus perspective Taking, submissive compassion and compassion goals.
Journal of Compassionate Health Care, 2017Co-Authors: Paul Gilbert, Francisca Catarino, Joana Sousa, Laura Ceresatto, Rosalind Moore, Jaskaran BasranAbstract:Research in the last 20 years has provided good evidence that developing compassion-focused motives for self and others has a range of benefits. However, people can behave in prosocial ways for different reasons, not all of which are genuinely care focused. This paper reports research comparing submissive compassion (being helpful to be liked) to “genuine” compassion in relation to domains of empathy and perspective Taking. We developed a new short (5 item) self-report scale (the competitive perspective Taking scale) to explore how people might use perspective Taking for self-focused reasons. We investigated its association with validated empathy and compassion measures. One hundred ninety nine students completed a range of questionnaires including a new short (5 item) self-report scale ‘The Competitive Perspective Taking Scale’ online or on paper at the end of lectures or during lecture breaks. Compassionate goals were positively correlated with the empathy quotient and its subscales. However, submissive compassion had a small negative correlation with the social skills subscale on the empathy quotient and was unrelated to other subscales. In addition, submissive compassion, unlike compassionate goals, was associated with submissive behaviour, shame, self-criticism, depression, anxiety and stress. Competitive perspective Taking was positively correlated with cognitive empathy on the emotional quotient but not emotional reactivity or social skills. These findings indicate there are individual differences in compassion motivation and the competencies of compassion, such as empathy and that these should be measured separately. In addition, the findings suggests that the higher peoples cognitive perspective Taking, the more they are able to recognise their ability to use empathy for beneficial reasons.
Amy Woodbridge - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Cognitive Perspective Taking and Audience Awareness in Second Grade Narrative Writing
2020Co-Authors: Amy WoodbridgeAbstract:Author(s): Woodbridge, Amy | Advisor(s): Bailey, Alison | Abstract: Children who display cognitive perspective Taking (CPT) abilities demonstrate the awareness that others have knowledge and understanding independent from their own. This ability is an aspect of theory of mind, which is linked to verbal conversational skills. Written language, however, differs from conversation, as it lacks a reciprocal exchange between reader and writer. Writers must anticipate the needs of their non-present readers. In this mixed-methods study, I examined whether CPT abilities in kindergarten related to audience awareness in 2nd grade narrative writing. Following this analysis, I further explored a subsample of students’ writing in order to determine how evidence of CPT appeared in narratives. This exploration was contextualized using interviews with participants’ 2nd grade teachers on the topics of perspective Taking and audience awareness. ANCOVA indicated no significant relationship between CPT abilities in kindergarten and audience awareness in 2nd grade. Most students in the subsample had begun to demonstrate features of CPT in their writing by 2nd grade. However, students with higher CPT abilities in kindergarten showed qualitative differences in the way they presented emotions, speech and dialogue, and an understanding of mental models through their writing.
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Cognitive Perspective Taking and Audience Awareness in Second Grade Narrative Writing - eScholarship
2020Co-Authors: Amy WoodbridgeAbstract:Children who display cognitive perspective Taking (CPT) abilities demonstrate the awareness that others have knowledge and understanding independent from their own. This ability is an aspect of theory of mind, which is linked to verbal conversational skills. Written language, however, differs from conversation, as it lacks a reciprocal exchange between reader and writer. Writers must anticipate the needs of their non-present readers. In this mixed-methods study, I examined whether CPT abilities in kindergarten related to audience awareness in 2nd grade narrative writing. Following this analysis, I further explored a subsample of students’ writing in order to determine how evidence of CPT appeared in narratives. This exploration was contextualized using interviews with participants’ 2nd grade teachers on the topics of perspective Taking and audience awareness. ANCOVA indicated no significant relationship between CPT abilities in kindergarten and audience awareness in 2nd grade. Most students in the subsample had begun to demonstrate features of CPT in their writing by 2nd grade. However, students with higher CPT abilities in kindergarten showed qualitative differences in the way they presented emotions, speech and dialogue, and an understanding of mental models through their writing.
Olga M. Klimecki - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Empathy and compassion
Current Biology, 2014Co-Authors: Tania Singer, Olga M. KlimeckiAbstract:As humans we are a highly social species: in order to coordinate our joint actions and assure successful communication, we use language skills to explicitly convey information to each other, and social abilities such as empathy or perspective Taking to infer another person's emotions and mental state. The human cognitive capacity to draw inferences about other peoples' beliefs, intentions and thoughts has been termed mentalizing, theory of mind or cognitive perspective Taking. This capacity makes it possible, for instance, to understand that people may have views that differ from our own. Conversely, the capacity to share the feelings of others is called empathy. Empathy makes it possible to resonate with others' positive and negative feelings alike - we can thus feel happy when we vicariously share the joy of others and we can share the experience of suffering when we empathize with someone in pain. Importantly, in empathy one feels with someone, but one does not confuse oneself with the other; that is, one still knows that the emotion one resonates with is the emotion of another. If this self-other distinction is not present, we speak of emotion contagion, a precursor of empathy that is already present in babies.
Paul Gilbert - One of the best experts on this subject based on the ideXlab platform.
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Measuring competitive self-focus perspective Taking, submissive compassion and compassion goals
Journal of Compassionate Health Care, 2017Co-Authors: Paul Gilbert, Francisca Catarino, Joana Sousa, Laura Ceresatto, Rosalind Moore, Jaskaran BasranAbstract:Background Research in the last 20 years has provided good evidence that developing compassion-focused motives for self and others has a range of benefits. However, people can behave in prosocial ways for different reasons, not all of which are genuinely care focused. This paper reports research comparing submissive compassion (being helpful to be liked) to “genuine” compassion in relation to domains of empathy and perspective Taking. We developed a new short (5 item) self-report scale (the competitive perspective Taking scale) to explore how people might use perspective Taking for self-focused reasons. We investigated its association with validated empathy and compassion measures. Methods One hundred ninety nine students completed a range of questionnaires including a new short (5 item) self-report scale ‘The Competitive Perspective Taking Scale’ online or on paper at the end of lectures or during lecture breaks. Results Compassionate goals were positively correlated with the empathy quotient and its subscales. However, submissive compassion had a small negative correlation with the social skills subscale on the empathy quotient and was unrelated to other subscales. In addition, submissive compassion, unlike compassionate goals, was associated with submissive behaviour, shame, self-criticism, depression, anxiety and stress. Competitive perspective Taking was positively correlated with cognitive empathy on the emotional quotient but not emotional reactivity or social skills. Conclusion These findings indicate there are individual differences in compassion motivation and the competencies of compassion, such as empathy and that these should be measured separately. In addition, the findings suggests that the higher peoples cognitive perspective Taking, the more they are able to recognise their ability to use empathy for beneficial reasons.
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Measuring competitive self-focus perspective Taking, submissive compassion and compassion goals.
Journal of Compassionate Health Care, 2017Co-Authors: Paul Gilbert, Francisca Catarino, Joana Sousa, Laura Ceresatto, Rosalind Moore, Jaskaran BasranAbstract:Research in the last 20 years has provided good evidence that developing compassion-focused motives for self and others has a range of benefits. However, people can behave in prosocial ways for different reasons, not all of which are genuinely care focused. This paper reports research comparing submissive compassion (being helpful to be liked) to “genuine” compassion in relation to domains of empathy and perspective Taking. We developed a new short (5 item) self-report scale (the competitive perspective Taking scale) to explore how people might use perspective Taking for self-focused reasons. We investigated its association with validated empathy and compassion measures. One hundred ninety nine students completed a range of questionnaires including a new short (5 item) self-report scale ‘The Competitive Perspective Taking Scale’ online or on paper at the end of lectures or during lecture breaks. Compassionate goals were positively correlated with the empathy quotient and its subscales. However, submissive compassion had a small negative correlation with the social skills subscale on the empathy quotient and was unrelated to other subscales. In addition, submissive compassion, unlike compassionate goals, was associated with submissive behaviour, shame, self-criticism, depression, anxiety and stress. Competitive perspective Taking was positively correlated with cognitive empathy on the emotional quotient but not emotional reactivity or social skills. These findings indicate there are individual differences in compassion motivation and the competencies of compassion, such as empathy and that these should be measured separately. In addition, the findings suggests that the higher peoples cognitive perspective Taking, the more they are able to recognise their ability to use empathy for beneficial reasons.