Motherhood and theory of mind: increased activation in affective theory of mind and emotion processing areas

Mapping Intimacies ◽

10.31219/osf.io/2cxks ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Irene Sophia Plank ◽

Catherine Hindi Attar ◽

Stefanie Kunas ◽

Isabel Dziobek ◽

Felix Bermpohl

Keyword(s):

Theory Of Mind ◽

Emotion Processing ◽

Region Of Interest ◽

Infants And Children ◽

Neural Activation ◽

Affective States ◽

Mind Task

There is growing evidence that parenthood changes how people face the specific needs and requests of infants and children, especially their own. However, little is known about the influence of parenthood on theory of mind, the capacity to infer mental and affective states of others and derive action predictions based on these states. It is also unclear whether the effects of parenthood generalise to inferring states of adults or are specific to children. In this study, we investigated neural activation in mothers and women without children during an affective theory of mind task that focuses on predicting action intentions from both child and adult faces. Region-of-interest analyses showed that both emotion and theory of mind areas were activated more strongly in mothers than women without children. These differences were not specific to child stimuli but occurred in response to both adult and child stimuli. Different neural recruitment of emotion and theory of mind related areas might indicate that mothers and non-mothers employ different strategies to infer action intentions from affective faces. Whether these general differences in affective theory of mind between mothers and non-mothers are due to biological or experience-related changes should be subject of further investigation.

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Effects of a genome-wide supported psychosis risk variant on neural activation during a theory-of-mind task

Molecular Psychiatry ◽

10.1038/mp.2010.18 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 16 (4) ◽

pp. 462-470 ◽

Cited By ~ 100

Author(s):

H Walter ◽

K Schnell ◽

S Erk ◽

C Arnold ◽

P Kirsch ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Theory Of Mind ◽

Neural Activation ◽

Risk Variant ◽

Genome Wide ◽

A Genome ◽

Psychosis Risk ◽

Mind Task

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Faculty Opinions recommendation of Effects of a genome-wide supported psychosis risk variant on neural activation during a theory-of-mind task.

Faculty Opinions – Post-Publication Peer Review of the Biomedical Literature ◽

10.3410/f.11515957.12555055 ◽

2011 ◽

Author(s):

Gary Donohoe ◽

David Mothersill

Keyword(s):

Theory Of Mind ◽

Neural Activation ◽

Risk Variant ◽

Genome Wide ◽

A Genome ◽

Psychosis Risk ◽

Mind Task

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Patterns of Brain Activity Supporting Autobiographical Memory, Prospection, and Theory of Mind, and Their Relationship to the Default Mode Network

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience ◽

10.1162/jocn.2009.21282 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 22 (6) ◽

pp. 1112-1123 ◽

Cited By ~ 511

Author(s):

R. Nathan Spreng ◽

Cheryl L. Grady

Keyword(s):

Theory Of Mind ◽

Default Mode Network ◽

Brain Activity ◽

Brain Structures ◽

Neural Activation ◽

Default Mode ◽

Cognitive Behaviors ◽

Core Set ◽

Multiple Processes ◽

Human Feature

The ability to rise above the present environment and reflect upon the past, the future, and the minds of others is a fundamentally defining human feature. It has been proposed that these three self-referential processes involve a highly interconnected core set of brain structures known as the default mode network (DMN). The DMN appears to be active when individuals are engaged in stimulus-independent thought. This network is a likely candidate for supporting multiple processes, but this idea has not been tested directly. We used fMRI to examine brain activity during autobiographical remembering, prospection, and theory-of-mind reasoning. Using multivariate analyses, we found a common pattern of neural activation underlying all three processes in the DMN. In addition, autobiographical remembering and prospection engaged midline DMN structures to a greater degree and theory-of-mind reasoning engaged lateral DMN areas. A functional connectivity analysis revealed that activity of a critical node in the DMN, medial prefrontal cortex, was correlated with activity in other regions in the DMN during all three tasks. We conclude that the DMN supports common aspects of these cognitive behaviors involved in simulating an internalized experience.

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875. Differences in Neural Activation during Implicit Facial Emotion Processing in Youth and Adults with Bipolar Disorder

Biological Psychiatry ◽

10.1016/j.biopsych.2017.02.600 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 81 (10) ◽

pp. S353-S354

Author(s):

Isabelle Bauer ◽

Nithya Ramakrishnan ◽

Stefan Ursu ◽

Kirti Saxena ◽

Giovana Zunta-Soares ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Bipolar Disorder ◽

Emotion Processing ◽

Facial Emotion ◽

Neural Activation ◽

Facial Emotion Processing

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Theory of mind and preschoolers' understanding of implicit causality in verbs: A comparison between Serbian and Hungarian children

Psihologija ◽

10.2298/psi1002187m ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 43 (2) ◽

pp. 187-198 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Agota Major ◽

Fabia Franco ◽

Marija Zotovic

Keyword(s):

Theory Of Mind ◽

Native Speakers ◽

Mother Tongue ◽

Implicit Causality ◽

Mind Task

This study aims to investigate the effect of theory of mind, age and mother tongue on the implicit causality effect in preschoolers from two different language backgrounds. Serbian and Hungarian native speakers aged 3-7 years participated in the study. After taking part in a Theory of Mind task, children were presented verbs in simple 'Subject verb Object' sentences describing interactions between two participants, with the interactions being based on emotional, mental or visual experiences. Children were asked 'Why does S verb O?' and their responses were categorized as containing an inference about the sentence-S or the sentence-O. The results show that Theory of Mind is a significant factor in the emergence of implicit causality, with age of participants and mother tongue being also contributing to explaining patterns of implicit causality.

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Dynamic Alterations in Neural Networks Supporting Aversive Learning in Children Exposed to Trauma: Neural Mechanisms Underlying Psychopathology

10.31234/osf.io/pz9m5 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Stephanie N. DeCross ◽

Kelly Sambrook ◽

Margaret Sheridan ◽

Nim Tottenham ◽

Katie A McLaughlin

Keyword(s):

Functional Connectivity ◽

Temporal Dynamics ◽

Longitudinal Design ◽

Region Of Interest ◽

Posterior Cingulate Cortex ◽

Parahippocampal Gyrus ◽

Functional Coupling ◽

Neural Activation ◽

Aversive Learning ◽

Frontal Pole

Altered aversive learning represents a potential mechanism through which childhood trauma (CT) might influence risk for psychopathology. This study examines the temporal dynamics of neural activation and patterns of functional connectivity during aversive learning in children with and without CT, and evaluates whether these neural patterns mediate the association of CT with psychopathology in a longitudinal design. 147 children (aged 8-16 years, 77 with CT) completed a fear conditioning procedure during an fMRI scan. Dynamic patterns of neural activation were examined in whole-brain and region-of-interest analyses; functional connectivity was assessed with generalized psychophysiological interaction analyses. We evaluated whether the associations between CT and psychopathology symptoms at baseline and two-year follow-up were mediated by neural activation and connectivity during aversive learning. Children exposed to trauma displayed blunted patterns of neural activation over time during CS+>CS- in right amygdala and during CS->CS+ in right hippocampus and frontal pole. Additionally, during CS+>CS-, CT was associated with elevated functional connectivity of right amygdala with fronto-parietal regions and reduced connectivity with hippocampus, posterior parahippocampal gyrus, and posterior cingulate cortex. The longitudinal association between CT and later externalizing symptoms was mediated by blunted activation in right amygdala and insula. Reduced amygdala-hippocampal connectivity mediated the association of CT with transdiagnostic anxiety symptoms. CT is associated with poor threat-safety discrimination and altered functional coupling between salience and default mode network regions during aversive learning. These altered neural dynamics during learning may be key mechanisms linking CT with internalizing and externalizing psychopathology.

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Theory of Mind Task--Verbal Stories

PsycTESTS Dataset ◽

10.1037/t11752-000 ◽

2011 ◽

Author(s):

V. P. Bozikas ◽

M. Giannakou ◽

M. H. Kosmidis ◽

P. Kargopoulos ◽

G. Kioseoglou ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Theory Of Mind ◽

Mind Task

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Preschool Theory of Mind Task

PsycTESTS Dataset ◽

10.1037/t28328-000 ◽

1989 ◽

Author(s):

Bradford H. Pillow

Keyword(s):

Theory Of Mind ◽

Mind Task

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Neural Correlates of Theory of Mind Are Preserved in Young Women With Anorexia Nervosa

Frontiers in Psychology ◽

10.3389/fpsyg.2020.568073 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 11 ◽

Author(s):

Monica Leslie ◽

Daniel Halls ◽

Jenni Leppanen ◽

Felicity Sedgewick ◽

Katherine Smith ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Anorexia Nervosa ◽

Prefrontal Cortex ◽

Theory Of Mind ◽

Social Interactions ◽

Young Women ◽

Inferior Frontal Gyrus ◽

Reliability And Validity ◽

Neural Correlates ◽

Neural Activation ◽

Neural Basis

People with anorexia nervosa (AN) commonly exhibit social difficulties, which may be related to problems with understanding the perspectives of others, commonly known as Theory of Mind (ToM) processing. However, there is a dearth of literature investigating the neural basis of these differences in ToM and at what age they emerge. This study aimed to test for differences in the neural correlates of ToM processes in young women with AN, and young women weight-restored (WR) from AN, as compared to healthy control participants (HC). Based on previous findings in AN, we hypothesized that young women with current or prior AN, as compared to HCs, would exhibit a reduced neural response in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), the inferior frontal gyrus, and the temporo-parietal junction (TPJ) whilst completing a ToM task. We recruited 73 young women with AN, 45 WR young women, and 70 young women without a history of AN to take part in the current study. Whilst undergoing a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scan, participants completed the Frith-Happé task, which is a commonly used measure of ToM with demonstrated reliability and validity in adult populations. In this task, participants viewed the movements of triangles, which depicted either action movements, simple interactions, or complex social interactions. Viewing trials with more complex social interactions in the Frith-Happé task was associated with increased brain activation in regions including the right TPJ, the bilateral mPFC, the cerebellum, and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. There were no group differences in neural activation in response to the ToM contrast. Overall, these results suggest that the neural basis of spontaneous mentalizing is preserved in most young women with AN.

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