Compassion meditation enhances empathic accuracy and related neural activity.

ABSTRACT: The ability to accurately infer others' mental states from facial expressions is important for optimal social functioning and is fundamentally impaired in social cognitive disorders such as autism. While pharmacologic interventions have shown promise for enhancing empathic accuracy, little is known about the effects of behavioral interventions on empathic accuracy and related brain activity. This study employed a randomized, controlled and longitudinal design to investigate the effect of a secularized analytical compassion meditation program, cognitive-based compassion training (CBCT), on empathic accuracy. Twenty-one healthy participants received functional MRI scans while completing an empathic accuracy task, the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET), both prior to and after completio

SUBMITTER: Mascaro JS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3541495 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature