Shared disbelief and shared belief: Belief and disbelief as drivers of interpersonal neural synchronization during narrative processing.

ABSTRACT: Despite living in an era where the mere concept of truth is increasingly contested, the cognitive processes underlying the processing of information we believe or disbelieve remain largely unexplored. In this fMRI study, we investigated how belief modulates narrative processing through belief context-the initial information indicating the speaker's credibility-and actual belief-the truth value ultimately assigned by the listener. Across two experiments, participants listened to narratives preceded by contexts explicitly stating whether the speaker was lying or telling the truth. Then, after listening to the narratives, they were asked to rate their actual belief. To investigate the effects of (dis)belief on narrative processing, we analyzed neural synchronization using inter-subject-correl

SUBMITTER: Braun G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12167953 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature