ArticleScientific reports2022
The role of the anterior insular during targeted helping behavior in male rats.
Article in Scientific reports, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 17 papers.
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Who cites it
17 citing papers in PubMed.
- Comparative insights into insula structure and function.Nature neuroscience · 2026Review
- Strain-Dependent Network Activity Differences Underlie Social Decision-Making in Male Mice.eNeuro · 2026Article
- Therapeutic modulation of empathy: pharmacological, neurostimulation, and behavioral approaches.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Review
- Vocal repertoire expansion in singing mice by co-opting a conserved midbrain circuit node.Current biology : CB · 2025Article
- Insular input to the prelimbic cortex underlies social affective behavior in rats.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Modulation of social valence by insular cortex activity during acute social isolation in mice.Molecular brain · 2025Article
- Prosocial Helping Behavior: Conceptual Issues and Neural Mechanisms.Biological psychiatry · 2025Review
- Distinct medial amygdala oxytocin receptor neurons projections respectively control consolation or aggression in male mandarin voles.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Neuronal, affective, and sensory correlates of targeted helping behavior in male and female Sprague Dawley rats.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2024Article
- In search of prosociality in rodents: A scoping review.PloS one · 2024Article
- Differential Roles of Oxytocin Receptors in the Prefrontal Cortex and Nucleus Accumbens on Cocaine Self-Administration and Reinstatement of Cued Cocaine Seeking in Male Rats.The international journal of neuropsychopharmacology · 2023Article
- Social circuits and their dysfunction in autism spectrum disorder.Molecular psychiatry · 2023Review
- The anterior insular cortex processes social recognition memory.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- How social information impacts action in rodents and humans: the role of the prefrontal cortex and its connections.Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews · 2023Review
- Article
- The intersection of empathy and addiction.Pharmacology, biochemistry, and behavior · 2023Review
- Social affective behaviors among female rats involve the basolateral amygdala and insular cortex.PloS one · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
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Abstract
Empathy, the understanding of the emotional state of others, can be examined across species using the Perception Action Model, where shared affect promotes an action by "Observers" to aid a distressed "Target". The anterior insula (AI) has garnered interest in empathic behavior due to its role integrating sensory and emotional information of self and other. In the following studies, the AI was inhibited pharmacologically and chemogenetically during targeted helping. We demonstrate the insula is active during, and is necessary for the maintenance of, targeted helping. Analysis of ultrasonic vocalizations revealed distress calls from Targets increased when Observers' helping was attenuated due to insula inhibition. Targets' elevated distress was directly correlated to Observers' diminished helping behavior, suggesting emotional transfer between Observer and Target is blunted following Observer AI inhibition. Finally, the AI may selectively blunt targeted helping, as social exploration did not change in a social reward place conditioning task. These studies help further establish the anterior insula as a critical node in the empathic brain during targeted helping, even in the absence of direct social contact.
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