Neuronal activation patterns during self-referential pain imagination.

In clinical assessments and pain therapy, patients are asked to imagine themselves in pain. However, the underlying neuronal processes remain poorly understood. Prior research has focused on empathy for pain or reported small sample sizes.

Insights into the molecular genetic basis of individual differences in metacognition.

There is a striking lack of studies on the molecular genetic basis of metacognition, i.e., the higher-order ability to monitor mental processes.

Effects of the glucocorticoid receptor gene (NR3C1) and subjective birth experience on the risk of postpartum depression and maternal bonding.

Postpartum depression (PPD) is a serious health care issue that affects a substantial share of women giving birth. PPD is considered a severe stress response that is likely associated with impaired HPA-axis activity. However, genetic findings regarding HPA-axis effects on PPD are scarce and inconsistent.

The negative impact of xenophobia on compassion with suffering out-group members is attenuated by trait empathy.

Empathy enables human beings to understand and share the internal states of others. Studies show that empathy for pain is higher for in-group compared to out-group members. This might be driven by attitudes and biases towards out-groups.

Additive serotonergic genetic sensitivity and cortisol reactivity to lab-based social evaluative stress: Influence of severity across two samples.

Prior work demonstrates that an additive serotonergic multilocus genetic profile score (MGPS) predicts amplified risk for depression following significant life stress, and that it interacts with elevations in the cortisol awakening response to predict depression. The serotonin system and HPA-axis have bidirectional influence, but whether this MGPS predicts acute cortisol reactivity, which might then serve as a mechanism for depression, is unknown. Our prior work suggests that depression risk factors predict blunted cortisol reactivity to explicit negative evaluative lab-based stress.