Mood congruency affects physiological synchrony but not empathic accuracy in a naturalistic empathy task.

Empathy is a crucial aspect of our daily lives, as it enhances our wellbeing and is a proxy for prosocial behavior. It encompasses two related but partially distinct components: cognitive and affective empathy. Both are susceptible to context, biases and an individual's physiological state.

Impaired empathic accuracy following damage to the left hemisphere.

Failing to understand others accurately can be extremely costly. Unfortunately, events such as strokes can lead to a decline in emotional understanding. Such impairments have been documented in stroke patients and are widely hypothesized to be related to right-hemisphere lesions, as well as to the amygdala, and are thought to be driven in part by attentional biases, for example, less fixation on the eyes.

The contribution of linguistic and visual cues to physiological synchrony and empathic accuracy.

There is an ongoing debate concerning the contribution of different aspects of empathy to achieving an accurate understanding of others. In this study, we aimed to better comprehend the roles of experience sharing and mentalizing using a modified empathic-accuracy task. We analyzed the unique contribution of each of these mechanisms with an explicit cognitive report as well as an affective physiological synchrony measurement.

The interactive effect of empathy and motor cortex stimulation on hand gesture comprehension.

Previous research has demonstrated that the Action-Observation Network (AON) is involved in both emotional-embodiment (empathy) and action-embodiment mechanisms. In the current study, we hypothesized that interfering with the AON will impair action recognition and that this impairment will be modulated by empathy levels. Fifty-two participants conducted a semantic decision task of hand gesture recognition, while we interfered with the AON by applying active (n = 26) or sham (n = 26) transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) to the hand area of the primary motor cortex.

The interaction between embodiment and empathy in facial expression recognition.

Previous research has demonstrated that the Action-Observation Network (AON) is involved in both emotional-embodiment (empathy) and action-embodiment mechanisms. In this study, we hypothesized that interfering with the AON will impair action recognition and that this impairment will be modulated by empathy levels. In Experiment 1 (n = 90), participants were asked to recognize facial expressions while their facial motion was restricted.

The Role of Embodiment and Individual Empathy Levels in Gesture Comprehension.

Research suggests that the action-observation network is involved in both emotional-embodiment (empathy) and action-embodiment (imitation) mechanisms. Here we tested whether empathy modulates action-embodiment, hypothesizing that restricting imitation abilities will impair performance in a hand gesture comprehension task. Moreover, we hypothesized that empathy levels will modulate the imitation restriction effect.