TY - JOUR
T1 - Neural evidence that three dimensions organize mental state representation
T2 - Rationality, social impact, and valence
AU - Tamir, Diana I.
AU - Thornton, Mark A.
AU - Contreras, Juan Manuel
AU - Mitchell, Jason P.
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank Talia Konkle, Brenda Li, Radhika Rastogi, Eve Wesson, and Ava Zhang. D.I.T. was supported by NIH Blueprint for Neuroscience Research Training Grant T90DA022759. M.A.T. and J.M.C. were supported by Graduate Research Fellowships from the National Science Foundation (DGE 1144152). M.A.T. was also supported by The Sackler Scholar Programme in Psychobiology. The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of the General Services Administration or the United States Government.
PY - 2016/1/5
Y1 - 2016/1/5
N2 - How do people understand the minds of others? Existing psychological theories have suggested a number of dimensions that perceivers could use to make sense of others' internal mental states. However, it remains unclear which of these dimensions, if any, the brain spontaneously uses when we think about others. The present study used multivoxel pattern analysis (MVPA) of neuroimaging data to identify the primary organizing principles of social cognition. We derived four unique dimensions of mental state representation from existing psychological theories and used functional magnetic resonance imaging to test whether these dimensions organize the neural encoding of others' mental states. MVPA revealed that three such dimensions could predict neural patterns within the medial prefrontal and parietal cortices, temporoparietal junction, and anterior temporal lobes during social thought: rationality, social impact, and valence. These results suggest that these dimensions serve as organizing principles for our understanding of other people.
AB - How do people understand the minds of others? Existing psychological theories have suggested a number of dimensions that perceivers could use to make sense of others' internal mental states. However, it remains unclear which of these dimensions, if any, the brain spontaneously uses when we think about others. The present study used multivoxel pattern analysis (MVPA) of neuroimaging data to identify the primary organizing principles of social cognition. We derived four unique dimensions of mental state representation from existing psychological theories and used functional magnetic resonance imaging to test whether these dimensions organize the neural encoding of others' mental states. MVPA revealed that three such dimensions could predict neural patterns within the medial prefrontal and parietal cortices, temporoparietal junction, and anterior temporal lobes during social thought: rationality, social impact, and valence. These results suggest that these dimensions serve as organizing principles for our understanding of other people.
KW - Functional magnetic resonance imaging
KW - Mentalizing
KW - Multivoxel pattern analysis
KW - Social cognition
KW - Theory of mind
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U2 - 10.1073/pnas.1511905112
DO - 10.1073/pnas.1511905112
M3 - Article
C2 - 26621704
AN - SCOPUS:84953252463
SN - 0027-8424
VL - 113
SP - 194
EP - 199
JO - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
JF - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
IS - 1
ER -