ArticleSocial cognitive and affective neuroscience2020
The role of trait empathy in the processing of observed actions in a false-belief task.
Article in Social cognitive and affective neuroscience, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Empathic Traits Modulate Oscillatory Dynamics Revealed by Time-Frequency Analysis During Body Language Reading.Brain sciences · 2025Article
- Slip or fallacy? Effects of error severity on own and observed pitch error processing in pianists.Cognitive, affective & behavioral neuroscience · 2023Article
- The impact of social anxiety on feedback-based go and nogo learning.Psychological research · 2022Article
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5 authors.
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Abstract
Empathic brain responses are characterized by overlapping activations between active experience and observation of an emotion in another person, with the pattern for observation being modulated by trait empathy. Also for self-performed and observed errors, similar brain activity has been described, but findings concerning the role of empathy are mixed. We hypothesized that trait empathy modulates the processing of observed responses if expectations concerning the response are based on the beliefs of the observed person. In the present study, we utilized a false-belief task in which observed person's and observer's task-related knowledge were dissociated and errors and correct responses could be expected or unexpected. While theta power was generally modulated by the expectancy of the observed response, a negative mediofrontal event-related potential (ERP) component was more pronounced for unexpected observed actions only in participants with higher trait empathy (assessed by the Empathy Quotient), as revealed by linear mixed effects analyses. Cognitive and affective empathy, assessed by the Interpersonal Reactivity Index, were not significantly related to the ERP component. The results suggest that trait empathy can facilitate the generation of predictions and thereby modulate specific aspects of the processing of observed actions, while the contributions of specific empathy components remain unclear.
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