ArticleSocial cognitive and affective neuroscience2015
Engaged listeners: shared neural processing of powerful political speeches.
Article in Social cognitive and affective neuroscience, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 61 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
61 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 143 citations in OpenAlex.
- Intersubject correlation as a predictor of attention: a systematic review.BMC psychology · 2025Pooled it
- The brain network in support of social semantic accumulation.Social cognitive and affective neuroscience · 2021Pooled it
- How Many Is Enough? Effect of Sample Size in Inter-Subject Correlation Analysis of fMRI.Computational intelligence and neuroscience · 2016Trial
- Delivery and Attitude Modulate Shared Neural Processing of Speech Through Distinct Frequency Channels.Psychophysiology · 2026Article
- Successful Public Speaking Enhances Neural Alignment in Audience Language Networks.Neurobiology of language (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2026Article
- Interpersonal heart rate synchrony and prosocial behaviors in musical contexts.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Review
- Neural Signatures of Engagement and Event Segmentation during Story Listening in Background Noise.eNeuro · 2026Article
- Article
- Perceived community alignment increases information sharing.Nature communications · 2025Article
- A naturalistic fMRI dataset in response to public speaking.Scientific data · 2025Article
- Negative Schizotypy Associated With Weaker Intersubject Correlation in Dynamic Functional Connectivity During Empathic Accuracy Task.Schizophrenia bulletin · 2025Article
- Eigenmodes of the deep unconscious: the neuropsychology of Jungian archetypes and psychedelic experience.Neuroscience of consciousness · 2025Review
- Behavioral science of voting in hypothetical utopia and dystopia scenarios: a predictive modeling approach.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Audio-visual concert performances synchronize audience's heart rates.Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences · 2025Article
- Neural speech tracking in a virtual acoustic environment: audio-visual benefit for unscripted continuous speech.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2025Article
- Portable EEG in groups shows increased brain coupling to strong health messages.Social cognitive and affective neuroscience · 2024Article
- Deciphering the neural responses to a naturalistic persuasive message.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- Movement synchrony among dance performers predicts brain synchrony among dance spectators.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Hyperscanning shows friends explore and strangers converge in conversation.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Intersubject correlations in reward and mentalizing brain circuits separately predict persuasiveness of two types of ISIS video propaganda.Scientific reports · 2024Article
1 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Powerful speeches can captivate audiences, whereas weaker speeches fail to engage their listeners. What is happening in the brains of a captivated audience? Here, we assess audience-wide functional brain dynamics during listening to speeches of varying rhetorical quality. The speeches were given by German politicians and evaluated as rhetorically powerful or weak. Listening to each of the speeches induced similar neural response time courses, as measured by inter-subject correlation analysis, in widespread brain regions involved in spoken language processing. Crucially, alignment of the time course across listeners was stronger for rhetorically powerful speeches, especially for bilateral regions of the superior temporal gyri and medial prefrontal cortex. Thus, during powerful speeches, listeners as a group are more coupled to each other, suggesting that powerful speeches are more potent in taking control of the listeners' brain responses. Weaker speeches were processed more heterogeneously, although they still prompted substantially correlated responses. These patterns of coupled neural responses bear resemblance to metaphors of resonance, which are often invoked in discussions of speech impact, and contribute to the literature on auditory attention under natural circumstances. Overall, this approach opens up possibilities for research on the neural mechanisms mediating the reception of entertaining or persuasive messages.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.