From heart to mind: Linking interoception, emotion, and theory of mind.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Shah P
PROVIDER: S-EPMC5542037 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Aug
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
From heart to mind: Linking interoception, emotion, and theory of mind.
Shah Punit P Catmur Caroline C Bird Geoffrey G
Cortex; a journal devoted to the study of the nervous system and behavior 20170502
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Project description:The ability to represent mental states (theory of mind [ToM]) is crucial in understanding individual differences in social ability and social impairments evident in conditions such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET) is a popular measure of ToM ability, validated in part by the poor performance of those with ASD. However, the RMET requires recognition of facial emotion, which is impaired in those with alexithymia, which frequently co-occurs with ASD. Thus, it is unclear whether the RMET indexes emotion recognition, associated with alexithymia, or ToM, associated with ASD. We therefore investigated the independent contributions of ASD and alexithymia to performance on the RMET. ASD and alexithymia-matched control participants did not differ on RMET performance, whereas ASD participants demonstrated impaired performance on an alternative test of ToM, the Movie for Assessment of Social Cognition (MASC). Furthermore, alexithymia, but not ASD diagnosis, significantly influenced RMET performance but did not affect MASC performance. These results suggest that the RMET measures emotion recognition rather than ToM ability and support the alexithymia hypothesis of emotion-related deficits in ASD. (PsycINFO Database Record
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Project description:Growing research on parental mind-mindedness has revealed significant positive associations between parents' appropriate mind-minded (MM) comments to their infants and children's future theory of mind (ToM). In turn, ToM has been broadly linked with a range of social-moral competencies. However, few (if any) studies have examined long-term paths from mothers' and fathers' mind-mindedness in infancy to conscience at early school age, with ToM serving as a mediator of those links. We tested such a model in a prospective longitudinal study of 102 community infants, mothers, and fathers. Parents' MM comments to their infants were coded in naturalistic interactions in snack and play contexts at 7 months. Children's ToM was assessed in false-belief tasks at 4.5 and 5.5 years, and two aspects of their conscience were assessed at 6.5 years: discomfort following transgressions and prosocial judgments in hypothetical moral dilemmas. We tested our model in a comprehensive path analysis that accounted for developmental continuity of both aspects of conscience. Children's ToM was positively associated with both measures of future conscience. The long-term paths from parental mind-mindedness in infancy to conscience were found for mother-child relationships only. For mothers and children, we supported the paths from maternal appropriate MM comments during a snack context in infancy to both aspects of children's conscience mediated by children's ToM. The findings extend earlier evidence suggesting the potentially important role of the parent-child interactive context for long-term effects of early parental mind-mindedness and highlight differences in the roles MM comments may play in mother-child and father-child relationships.
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Project description:Research on social cognition has fruitfully applied computational modeling approaches to explain how observers understand and reason about others' mental states. By contrast, there has been less work on modeling observers' understanding of emotional states. We propose an intuitive theory framework to studying affective cognition-how humans reason about emotions-and derive a taxonomy of inferences within affective cognition. Using this taxonomy, we review formal computational modeling work on such inferences, including causal reasoning about how others react to events, reasoning about unseen causes of emotions, reasoning with multiple cues, as well as reasoning from emotions to other mental states. In addition, we provide a roadmap for future research by charting out inferences-such as hypothetical and counterfactual reasoning about emotions-that are ripe for future computational modeling work. This framework proposes unifying these various types of reasoning as Bayesian inference within a common "intuitive Theory of Emotion." Finally, we end with a discussion of important theoretical and methodological challenges that lie ahead in modeling affective cognition.
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Project description:BackgroundMounting studies have investigated impairments in social cognitive domains (including theory of mind [ToM] and facial emotion recognition [FER] in adult patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE). However, to date, inconsistent findings remain.MethodsA search of PubMed, Web of Science, and Embase databases was conducted until December 2021. Hedges g effect sizes were computed with a random-effects model. Meta-regressions were used to assess the potential confounding factors of between-study variability in effect sizes.ResultsThe meta-analysis included 41 studies, with a combined sample of 1,749 adult patients with TLE and 1,324 healthy controls (HCs). Relative to HCs, adult patients with TLE showed large impairments in ToM (g = -0.92) and cognitive ToM (g = -0.92), followed by medium impairments in affective ToM (g = -0.79) and FER (g = -0.77). Besides, no (statistically) significant differences were observed between the magnitude of social cognition impairment in adult with TLE who underwent and those who did not undergo epilepsy surgery. Meta-regressions exhibited that greater severity of executive functioning was associated with more severe ToM defects, and older age was associated with more severe FER defects.ConclusionsResults of this meta-analysis suggest that adult patients with TLE show differential impairments in the core aspects of social cognitive domains (including ToM and FER), which may help in planning individualized treatment with appropriate cognitive and behavioral interventions.
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Project description:This paper introduces a model of 'theory of mind', namely, how we represent the intentions and goals of others to optimise our mutual interactions. We draw on ideas from optimum control and game theory to provide a 'game theory of mind'. First, we consider the representations of goals in terms of value functions that are prescribed by utility or rewards. Critically, the joint value functions and ensuing behaviour are optimised recursively, under the assumption that I represent your value function, your representation of mine, your representation of my representation of yours, and so on ad infinitum. However, if we assume that the degree of recursion is bounded, then players need to estimate the opponent's degree of recursion (i.e., sophistication) to respond optimally. This induces a problem of inferring the opponent's sophistication, given behavioural exchanges. We show it is possible to deduce whether players make inferences about each other and quantify their sophistication on the basis of choices in sequential games. This rests on comparing generative models of choices with, and without, inference. Model comparison is demonstrated using simulated and real data from a 'stag-hunt'. Finally, we note that exactly the same sophisticated behaviour can be achieved by optimising the utility function itself (through prosocial utility), producing unsophisticated but apparently altruistic agents. This may be relevant ethologically in hierarchal game theory and coevolution.
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Project description:Human strategic interaction requires reasoning about other people's behavior and mental states, combined with an understanding of their incentives. However, the ontogenic development of strategic reasoning is not well understood: At what age do we show a capacity for sophisticated play in social interactions? Several lines of inquiry suggest an important role for recursive thinking (RT) and theory of mind (ToM), but these capacities leave out the strategic element. We posit a strategic theory of mind (SToM) integrating ToM and RT with reasoning about incentives of all players. We investigated SToM in 3- to 9-y-old children and adults in two games that represent prevalent aspects of social interaction. Children anticipate deceptive and competitive moves from the other player and play both games in a strategically sophisticated manner by 7 y of age. One game has a pure strategy Nash equilibrium: In this game, children achieve equilibrium play by the age of 7 y on the first move. In the other game, with a single mixed-strategy equilibrium, children's behavior moved toward the equilibrium with experience. These two results also correspond to two ways in which children's behavior resembles adult behavior in the same games. In both games, children's behavior becomes more strategically sophisticated with age on the first move. Beyond the age of 7 y, children begin to think about strategic interaction not myopically, but in a farsighted way, possibly with a view to cooperating and capitalizing on mutual gains in long-run relationships.
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Project description:Background: Several meta-analyses highlight pronounced problems in general Theory of Mind (ToM), the ability to infer other persons' mental states, in patients with psychosis in comparison to non-clinical controls. In addition, first studies suggest associations between Hyper-ToM, an exaggerated inference of mental states to others, and delusions. Research on different ToM subtypes (Cognitive ToM, Affective ToM, and Hyper-ToM) and symptom clusters of psychosis (positive, negative, and disorganized symptoms) have gathered conflicting findings. Thus, the present study examined group differences between patients with psychosis and non-clinical controls concerning Cognitive ToM/Affective ToM and Hyper-ToM. Further, the association between ToM subtypes and symptom clusters (positive, negative, and disorganized symptoms) were examined. Methods: Patients with psychotic disorders (n = 64, 1/3 with present delusions indicated by a minimum score of four in the PANSS P1 item) and non-clinical controls (n = 21) were examined with assessments of Cognitive ToM and Affective ToM abilities and Hyper-ToM errors using the Frith-Happé animations. Psychopathology was assessed using the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale. Results: Patients with psychosis presented more pronounced problems in Cognitive and Affective ToM in comparison to non-clinical controls, whereas there were no group differences with regard to Hyper-ToM errors. Furthermore, deficits in Cognitive ToM were associated with general delusions, whereas problems in Affective ToM were associated with negative and disorganized symptoms. In addition, there was no association between Hyper-ToM errors and any symptoms when controlling for years of education. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that deficits in ToM subtypes might not be directly related to delusions and positive symptoms and are in line with more recently developed cognitive models of delusions. In addition, our results support the well-established finding of associations between ToM alterations and negative or disorganized symptoms. Our results shed light on the role of different dimensions of ToM in specific symptoms of psychosis.
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Project description:PurposeThe aim of this study was to determine the feasibility and effectiveness of a 25-week school-based intervention and its ability to improve interoception and emotion regulation in an autistic pediatric population.MethodOne-group pre- and posttest design implementing The Interoception Curriculum: A Guide to Developing Mindful Self-Regulation in a self-contained school. Participants were 14 (11 male, 3 female) students between 9 and 19 years old. The Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function 2 (BRIEF-2) and the Caregiver Questionnaire for Interoceptive Awareness-2nd Edition (CQIA-2) were used to determine changes in interoceptive awareness and emotion regulation.ResultsStatistically significant improvements were found between the preintervention and postintervention scores for both interoceptive awareness and emotion regulation.ConclusionThis was the first study to examine the Interoception Curriculum in its entirety, providing evidence that the use of the Interoception Curriculum is feasible in a school setting and suggests that this intervention is effective for improvement of interoception. Findings also suggest that this improvement in interoception is related to improvement in emotional regulation for an autistic pediatric population.
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Project description:Functional MRI studies report insular activations across a wide range of tasks involving affective, sensory, and motor processing, but also during tasks of high-level perception, attention, and control. Although insular cortical activations are often reported in the literature, the diverse functional roles of this region are still not well understood. We used a meta-analytic approach to analyze the coactivation profiles of insular subdivisions-dorsal anterior, ventral anterior, and posterior insula-across fMRI studies in terms of multiple task domains including emotion, memory, attention, and reasoning. We found extensive coactivation of each insular subdivision, with substantial overlap between coactivation partners for each subdivision. Functional fingerprint analyses revealed that all subdivisions cooperated with a functionally diverse set of regions. Graph-theoretical analyses revealed that the dorsal anterior insula was a highly "central" structure in the coactivation network. Furthermore, analysis of the studies that activate the insular cortex itself showed that the right dorsal anterior insula was a particularly "diverse" structure in that it was likely to be active across multiple task domains. These results highlight the nuanced functional profiles of insular subdivisions and are consistent with recent work suggesting that the dorsal anterior insula can be considered a critical functional hub in the human brain.
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