infonet-economy

After defining “cognitive perspective taking” and “empathy” we will review the main results of neuroscientific studies of the human ability to understand other people's intentions, beliefs, and experiences. We will then present several fMRI studies investigating empathic brain responses elicited by the observation of others in pain and show how these empathic brain responses are modulated by several contextual and stimulus factors. We will integrate these results with findings on patients with Alexithymia (inability to understand and label distinct emotions and emotional experiences) and Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD; a neurological condition associated with a variety of social and linguistic deficits) to create a deeper
understanding of the relations between interoceptive awareness, empathy, and cognitive perspective taking.