Correlations between social-emotional feelings and anterior insula activity are independent from visceral states but influenced by culture.

ABSTRACT: The anterior insula (AI) maps visceral states and is active during emotional experiences, a functional confluence that is central to neurobiological accounts of feelings. Yet, it is unclear how AI activity correlates with feelings during social emotions, and whether this correlation may be influenced by culture, as studies correlating real-time AI activity with visceral states and feelings have focused on Western subjects feeling physical pain or basic disgust. Given psychological evidence that social-emotional feelings are cognitively constructed within cultural frames, we asked Chinese and American participants to report their feeling strength to admiration and compassion-inducing narratives during fMRI with simultaneous electrocardiogram recording. Trial-by-trial, cardiac arousal and fe

SUBMITTER: Immordino-Yang MH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4165215 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature