Characterization of the temporal stability of ToM and pain functional brain networks carry distinct developmental signatures during naturalistic viewing.

A temporally stable functional brain network pattern among coordinated brain regions is fundamental to stimulus selectivity and functional specificity during the critical period of brain development. Brain networks that are recruited in time to process internal states of others' bodies (like hunger and pain) versus internal mental states (like beliefs, desires, and emotions) of others' minds allow us to ask whether a quantitative characterization of the stability of these networks carries meaning during early development and constrain cognition in a specific way. Previous research provides critical insight into the early development of the theory-of-mind (ToM) network and its segregation from the Pain network throughout normal development using functional connectivity. However, a quantitative characterization of the temporal stability of ToM networks from early childhood to adulthood remains unexplored. In this work, reusing a large sample of children (n = 122, 3-12 years) and adults (n = 33) dataset that is available on the OpenfMRI database under the accession number ds000228, we addressed this question based on their fMRI data during a short and engaging naturalistic movie-watching task. The movie highlights the characters' bodily sensations (often pain) and mental states (beliefs, desires, emotions), and is a feasible experiment for young children. Our results tracked the change in temporal stability using an unsupervised characterization of ToM and Pain networks DFC patterns using Angular and Mahalanobis distances between dominant dynamic functional connectivity subspaces. Our findings reveal that both ToM and Pain networks exhibit lower temporal stability as early as 3-years and gradually stabilize by 5-years, which continues till adolescence and late adulthood (often sharing similarity with adult DFC stability patterns). Furthermore, we find that the temporal stability of ToM brain networks is associated with the performance of participants in the false belief task to access mentalization at an early age. Interestingly, higher temporal stability is associated with the pass group, and similarly, moderate and low temporal stability are associated with the inconsistent group and the fail group. Our findings open an avenue for applying the temporal stability of large-scale functional brain networks during cortical development to act as a biomarker for multiple developmental disorders concerning impairment and discontinuity in the neural basis of social cognition.

Action expectancy modulates activity in the mirror neuron system and mentalizing system.

Action understanding involves two distinct processing levels that engage separate neural mechanisms: perception of concrete kinematic information and recognition of abstract action intentions. The mirror neuron system and the mentalizing system have both been linked to concrete action and abstract information processing, but their specific roles remain debatable. Here, we conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging study with 26 participants who passively observed expected and unexpected actions. We performed whole-brain activation, region of interest, and effective connectivity analyses to investigate the neural correlates of these actions. Whole-brain activation analyses revealed that expected actions were associated with increased activation in the left medial superior frontal gyrus, while unexpected actions were linked to heightened activity in the left supramarginal gyrus, left superior parietal lobule, right inferior temporal gyrus, and left middle frontal gyrus. Region of interest analyses demonstrated that the left ventral premotor cortex exhibited greater activation during the observation of expected actions compared to unexpected actions, while the left inferior frontal gyrus, left superior parietal lobule, and left precuneus showed stronger activation during the observation of unexpected actions. Effective connectivity was observed between the left ventral premotor cortex and the left angular gyrus, left intraparietal sulcus, left dorsal premotor cortex, and left ventromedial prefrontal cortex with the middle frontal gyrus when observing unexpected, but not expected, actions. These findings suggest that expected actions are primarily processed by the mirror neuron system, whereas unexpected actions engage both the mirror neuron system and the mentalizing system, with these systems playing complementary roles in the understanding of unexpected actions.

Inhibitory Control Partially Mediates the Relationship between Metalinguistic Awareness and Perspective-Taking.

Increased metalinguistic awareness (MLA) has been associated with improved performance in tasks of theory of mind; researchers have proposed that individuals with increased MLA, such as bilinguals, rely on metalinguistic skills when completing tasks that require taking other people's perspective into account compared to other individuals who mostly rely on general executive control to complete the same tasks. MLA would, therefore, act as a less effortful path to understanding other perspectives, especially when they differ from one's own. However, the evidence underlying this claim is scant and largely limited to children's theoretical frameworks. In this study, we investigated whether individual differences in MLA predict perspective-taking Theory of Mind above and beyond inhibitory control in a sample of diverse adults across a wide range of linguistic, socioeconomic, and cognitive factors. Bootstrapped mediation analyses revealed that inhibitory control partially, but not fully, mediated the relationship between MLA and perspective-taking. In addition, when differences in language, education and culture were controlled for, the effects of both MLA and inhibitory control were reduced. Overall, the findings emphasize the need to consider multivariate approaches towards understanding the mechanisms underlying theory of mind.

Executive functions and theory of mind associations in middle childhood: Does social interaction act as a mediator?

This study explored the interplay of executive functions (EFs), social interactions, and theory of mind (ToM) in middle childhood. The first aim was to examine how specific EFs-shifting, inhibition, and working memory (WM)-predict social-perceptual and social-cognitive ToM. The second aim was to explore the potential mediating role of social interactions in the EF-ToM relationship. A total of 98 children aged 8 to 11 years completed three computerized EF tasks (task switching, flanker, and running span) and two ToM tasks (Strange Stories and Reading the Mind in the Eyes). The quality and quantity of social interactions were self-reported by using questionnaires. First, multiple regression analyses with age-adjusted scores examined how specific EFs predict ToM scores. The regression model was significant for social-cognitive ToM, but not for social-perceptual ToM. WM accuracy was the only significant, positive predictor for performance on the Strange Stories task. Second, mediation analyses assessed whether social interactions mediate this EF-ToM relationship. There were no significant mediation effects of the quality and quantity of social interactions on the relationship between WM and social-cognitive ToM. In conclusion, EFs play a significant role in explaining social-cognitive ToM variability in middle childhood. WM is relevant for understanding others' mental states, in contrast to shifting and inhibition that lacked predictive value. The results also suggest different cognitive processes associated with social-perceptual versus social-cognitive ToM in this developmental stage.

Continuity in false belief understanding from 33 to 52 months of age.

Conceptual continuity in children's false belief understanding from toddlerhood to childhood was investigated in a longitudinal study of 75 children. Performance in a low-demands false belief task at 33 months of age was significantly correlated with performance in a content false belief task at 52 months independent of language ability and executive function. In contrast, there was no correlation with performance in a location false belief task, which differed from the "Sally-Anne" format of the low-demands task and was high in executive demands. These findings support the view that explicit false belief understanding may be continuous from toddlerhood to childhood and that developmental change may be characterized in terms of enrichment and increasing stability of core conceptual understanding rather than in terms of fundamental change.

Tracking politically motivated reasoning in the brain: the role of mentalizing, value-encoding, and error detection networks.

Susceptibility to misinformation and belief polarization often reflects people's tendency to incorporate information in a biased way. Despite the presence of competing theoretical models, the underlying neurocognitive mechanisms of motivated reasoning remain elusive as previous empirical work did not properly track the belief formation process. To address this problem, we employed a design that identifies motivated reasoning as directional deviations from a Bayesian benchmark of unbiased belief updating. We asked the members of a proimmigration or an anti-immigration group regarding the extent to which they endorse factual messages on foreign criminality, a polarizing political topic. Both groups exhibited a desirability bias by overendorsing attitude-consistent messages and underendorsing attitude-discrepant messages and an identity bias by overendorsing messages from in-group members and underendorsing messages from out-group members. In both groups, neural responses to the messages predicted subsequent expression of desirability and identity biases, suggesting a common neural basis of motivated reasoning across ideologically opposing groups. Specifically, brain regions implicated in encoding value, error detection, and mentalizing tracked the degree of desirability bias. Less extensive activation in the mentalizing network tracked the degree of identity bias. These findings illustrate the distinct neurocognitive architecture of desirability and identity biases and inform existing cognitive models of politically motivated reasoning.

Synergy of the mirror neuron system and the mentalizing system in a single brain and between brains during joint actions.

Cooperative action involves the simulation of actions and their co-representation by two or more people. This requires the involvement of two complex brain systems: the mirror neuron system (MNS) and the mentalizing system (MENT), both of critical importance for successful social interaction. However, their internal organization and the potential synergy of both systems during joint actions (JA) are yet to be determined. The aim of this study was to examine the role and interaction of these two fundamental systems-MENT and MNS-during continuous interaction. To this hand, we conducted a multiple-brain connectivity analysis in the source domain during a motor cooperation task using high-density EEG dual-recordings providing relevant insights into the roles of MNS and MENT at the intra- and interbrain levels. In particular, the intra-brain analysis demonstrated the essential function of both systems during JA, as well as the crucial role played by single brain regions of both neural mechanisms during cooperative activities. Specifically, our intra-brain analysis revealed that both neural mechanisms are essential during Joint Action (JA), showing a solid connection between MNS and MENT and a central role of the single brain regions of both mechanisms during cooperative actions. Additionally, our inter-brain study revealed increased inter-subject connections involving the motor system, MENT and MNS. Thus, our findings show a mutual influence between two interacting agents, based on synchronization of MNS and MENT systems. Our results actually encourage more research into the still-largely unknown realm of inter-brain dynamics and contribute to expand the body of knowledge in social neuroscience.

Influences of heart rate feedback and autistic traits on affective mindreading.

Although mindreading is an important prerequisite for successful social interactions, the underlying mechanisms are still matter of debate. It is unclear, for example, if inferring others' and own mental states are distinct processes or are based on a common mechanism. Using an affect-induction experimental set-up with an acoustic heart rate feedback that addresses affective mindreading in self and others, we investigated if non-autistic study participants relied on similar information for self- and other-directed mindreading. We assumed that due to altered mindreading capacities in autism, mainly individuals with low autistic traits would focus on additional sensory cues, such as heart rate, to infer their own and their gambling partner's affective states. Our analyses showed that the interpretation of a heart rate signal differed in self- and other-directed mindreading trials. This effect was modulated by autistic traits suggesting that individuals with higher autistic traits might not have interpreted the heart rate feedback for gambling partner ratings and differentiated less between self- and other-directed mindreading trials. We discuss these results in the context of a common mechanism underlying self- and other-directed mindreading and hypothesize that the weighting of internal and external sensory information might contribute to how we make sense of our and others' mental states.

Large language models have divergent effects on self-perceptions of mind and the attributes considered uniquely human.

The rise of powerful Large Language Models (LLMs) provides a compelling opportunity to investigate the consequences of anthropomorphism, particularly regarding how their exposure may influence the way individuals view themselves (self-perception) and other people (other-perception). Using a mind perception framework, we examined attributions of agency (the ability to do) and experience (the ability to feel). Participants evaluated their agentic and experiential capabilities and the extent to which these features are uniquely human before and after exposure to LLM responses. Post-exposure, participants increased evaluations of their agentic and experiential qualities while decreasing their perception that agency and experience are considered to be uniquely human. These results indicate that anthropomorphizing LLMs impacts attributions of mind for humans in fundamentally divergent ways: enhancing the perception of one's own mind while reducing its uniqueness for others. These results open up a range of future questions regarding how anthropomorphism can affect mind perception toward humans.

The neural structures of theory of mind are valence-sensitive: evidence from three tDCS studies.

Several cortical structures are involved in theory of mind (ToM), including the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC), the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), and the right temporo- parietal junction (rTPJ). We investigated the role of these regions in mind reading with respect to the valence of mental states. Sixty-five healthy adult participants were recruited and received transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) (1.5 mA, 20 min) with one week interval in three separate studies. The stimulation conditions were anodal tDCS over the dlPFC coupled with cathodal tDCS over the vmPFC, reversed stimulation conditions, and sham in the first study, and anodal tDCS over the vmPFC, or dlPFC, and sham stimulation, with an extracranial return electrode in the second and third study. During stimulation, participants underwent the reading mind from eyes/voice tests (RMET or RMVT) in each stimulation condition. Anodal left dlPFC/cathodal right vmPFC stimulation increased the accuracy of negative mental state attributions, anodal rTPJ decreased the accuracy of negative and neutral mental state attributions, and decreased the reaction time of positive mental state attributions. Our results imply that the neural correlates of ToM are valence-sensitive.

Precision mapping of the default network reveals common and distinct (inter) activity for autobiographical memory and theory of mind.

The default network is widely implicated as a common neural substrate for self-generated thought, such as remembering one's past (autobiographical memory) and imagining the thoughts and feelings of others (theory of mind). Findings that the default network comprises subnetworks of regions, some commonly and some distinctly involved across processes, suggest that one's own experiences inform their understanding of others. With the advent of precision functional MRI (fMRI) methods, however, it is unclear if this shared substrate is observed instead due to traditional group analysis methods. We investigated this possibility using a novel combination of methodological strategies. Twenty-three participants underwent multi-echo resting-state and task fMRI. We used their resting-state scans to conduct cortical parcellation sensitive to individual variation while preserving our ability to conduct group analysis. Using multivariate analyses, we assessed the functional activation and connectivity profiles of default network regions while participants engaged in autobiographical memory, theory of mind, or a sensorimotor control condition. Across the default network, we observed stronger activity associated with both autobiographical memory and theory of mind compared to the control condition. Nonetheless, we also observed that some regions showed preferential activity to either experimental condition, in line with past work. The connectivity results similarly indicated shared and distinct functional profiles. Our results support that autobiographical memory and theory of mind, two theoretically important and widely studied domains of social cognition, evoke common and distinct aspects of the default network even when ensuring high fidelity to individual-specific characteristics.NEW & NOTEWORTHY We used cutting-edge precision functional MRI (fMRI) methods such as multi-echo fMRI acquisition and denoising, a robust experimental paradigm, and individualized cortical parcellation across 23 participants to provide evidence that remembering one's past experiences and imagining the thoughts and feelings of others share a common neural substrate. Evidence from activation and connectivity analyses indicate overlapping and distinct functional profiles of these widely studied episodic and social processes.

Unlocking narratives: Longitudinal associations between theory of mind and reading comprehension.

This study explores the longitudinal association between Theory of Mind (ToM) and reading comprehension (RC) in middle childhood, focusing on three advanced ToM (AToM) components: social reasoning, reasoning about ambiguity and recognition of social norm transgressions. Over the course of a year, 112 nine-year-olds (61 girls, 51 boys; Mage = 9; 0 years, ±4 months at wave 1) were followed from Grade 3 to Grade 4 and assessed for AToM predictors of Grade-4 RC. Findings show that only social reasoning predicts RC, independent of general intelligence and prior RC performance. In turn, RC did not predict any AToM component. These findings contribute to understanding cognitive development in educational contexts, emphasizing the significance of AToM, particularly social reasoning, in RC.

Bystander responses in five-steps: Paving road to prosocial intervention to social exclusion through social-cognition.

To promote prosocial defending behaviours to social exclusion, it is important to understand the role of social-cognitive factors in bystanders' cognition, judgements and responses. The current research examined how social cognitive skills relate to different aspects of bystanders' cognition, judgements and responses in the five-step intervention model. Data were collected from 96 Turkish children and adolescents (Mage = 12.39 years, SD = 1.74, 59 girls, aged 10-17). Participants were presented with a hypothetical social exclusion scenario and their bystanders' cognition, judgements and responses were measured via five-step intervention model. Theory of mind (ToM), mind-reading motivation (MRM) and empathy were also measured as predictors. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that while ToM and MRM were more likely to predict bystanders' judgements and cognitions around social exclusion, empathy was also found to be correlated with behavioural aspects of bystanders' responses beside cognitions and judgements. Overall, our novel findings provide insight for intervention studies to promote prosocial bystanders' judgements, cognitions and responses by addressing different social-cognitive skills.

Neural correlates of static and dynamic social decision-making in real-time sibling interactions.

In traditional game theory tasks, social decision-making is centered on the prediction of the intentions (i.e., mentalizing) of strangers or manipulated responses. In contrast, real-life scenarios often involve familiar individuals in dynamic environments. Further research is needed to explore neural correlates of social decision-making with changes in the available information and environmental settings. This study collected fMRI hyperscanning data (N = 100, 46 same-sex pairs were analyzed) to investigate sibling pairs engaging in an iterated Chicken Game task within a competitive context, including two decision-making phases. In the static phase, participants chose between turning (cooperate) and continuing (defect) in a fixed time window. Participants could estimate the probability of different events based on their priors (previous outcomes and representation of other's intentions) and report their decision plan. The dynamic phase mirrored real-world interactions in which information is continuously changing (replicated within a virtual environment). Individuals had to simultaneously update their beliefs, monitor the actions of the other, and adjust their decisions. Our findings revealed substantial choice consistency between the two phases and evidence for shared neural correlates in mentalizing-related brain regions, including the prefrontal cortex, temporoparietal junction (TPJ), and precuneus. Specific neural correlates were associated with each phase; increased activation of areas associated with action planning and outcome evaluation were found in the static compared with the dynamic phase. Using the opposite contrast, dynamic decision-making showed higher activation in regions related to predicting and monitoring other's actions, including the anterior cingulate cortex and insula. Cooperation (turning), compared with defection (continuing), showed increased activation in mentalizing-related regions only in the static phase, while defection, relative to cooperation, exhibited higher activation in areas associated with conflict monitoring and risk processing in the dynamic phase. Men were less cooperative and had greater TPJ activation. Sibling competitive relationship did not predict competitive behavior but showed a tendency to predict brain activity during dynamic decision-making. Only individual brain activation results are included here, and no interbrain analyses are reported. These neural correlates emphasize the significance of considering varying levels of information available and environmental settings when delving into the intricacies of mentalizing during social decision-making among familiar individuals.

Theory of mind in epilepsy.

Epilepsy is characterized by recurrent, chronic, and unprovoked seizures. Epilepsy has a significant negative impact on a patient's quality of life even if seizures are well controlled. In addition to the distress caused by seizures, patients with epilepsy (PwE) may suffer from cognitive impairment with serious social consequences such as poor interpersonal relationships, loss of employment, and reduced social networks. Pathological changes and functional connectivity abnormalities observed in PwE can disrupt the neural network responsible for the theory of mind. Theory of mind is the ability to attribute mental states to other people (intentions, beliefs, and emotions). It is a complex aspect of social cognition and includes cognitive and affective constructs. In recent years, numerous studies have assessed the relationship between social cognition, including the theory of mind, in PwE, and suggested impairment in this domain. Interventions targeting the theory of mind can be potentially helpful in improving the quality of life of PwE.

Mentalizing self mind but not others: Self-reported mentalization difficulties in multiple sclerosis.

BACKGROUND: Mentalization can be defined as a mental process by which an individual directly or indirectly perceives and interprets one's own and others' behavior, emotions, beliefs, and needs based on designed mental states. Mentalization problems may be linked to remove associative white matter fiber disconnection. Multiple sclerosis (MS) is one of the diseases with white matter lesions. By comparing MS patients with healthy controls, it was aimed to assess whether MS patients' mentalization skills are affected. METHOD: This study involved 243 participants (170 healthy controls and 73 patients with MS). All the participants completed a sociodemographic questionnaire and the Mentalization Scale (MentS). RESULTS: While it was discovered that MentS scores for the dimension of others-based mentalization (MentS-O) were statistically lower in MS group, there was no statistically significant difference between the groups in terms of the dimensions of motivation to mentalize (MentS-M) and self-based mentalization (MentS-S) scores. CONCLUSION: We may conclude that MS patients have trouble comprehending other people's thoughts. This effect can be one of the causes of MS patients' issues with social cognition.

Effective connectivity analysis of resting-state mentalizing brain networks in spinocerebellar ataxia type 2: A dynamic causal modeling study.

Neuroimaging studies on healthy subjects described the causal effective connectivity of cerebellar-cerebral social mentalizing networks, revealing the presence of closed-loops. These studies estimated effective connectivity by applying Dynamic Causal Modeling on task-related fMRI data of healthy subjects performing mentalizing tasks. Thus far, few studies have applied Dynamic Causal Modeling to resting-state fMRI (rsfMRI) data to test the effective connectivity within the cerebellar-cerebral mentalizing network in the absence of experimental manipulations, and no study applied Dynamic Causal Modeling on fMRI data of patients with cerebellar disorders typically showing social cognition deficits. Thus, in this research we applied spectral Dynamic Causal Modeling, to rsfMRI data of 13 patients affected by spinocerebellar ataxia type 2 (SCA2) and of 23 matched healthy subjects. Specifically, effective connectivity was tested between acknowledged mentalizing regions of interest: bilateral cerebellar Crus II, dorsal and ventral medial prefrontal cortex, bilateral temporo-parietal junctions and precuneus. SCA2 and healthy subjects shared some similarities in cerebellar-cerebral mentalizing effective connectivity at rest, confirming the presence of closed-loops between cerebellar and cerebral mentalizing regions in both groups. However, relative to healthy subjects, SCA2 patients showed effective connectivity variations mostly in cerebellar-cerebral closed loops, namely weakened inhibitory connectivity from the cerebellum to the cerebral cortex, but stronger inhibitory connectivity from the cerebral cortex to the cerebellum. The present study demonstrated that effective connectivity changes affect a function-specific mentalizing network in SCA2 patients, allowing to deepen the direction and strength of the causal effective connectivity mechanisms driven by the cerebellar damage associated with SCA2.

Social and general cognition are uniquely associated with social connectedness in later life.

The mechanisms by which older adults maintain large, complex social networks are not well understood. Prior work has primarily focused on general cognitive ability (e.g., executive function, episodic memory), largely overlooking social cognition-the ability to process, store, and remember social information. Because social cognition plays a key role in navigating social interactions and is distinct from general cognition, we examined whether general and social cognition uniquely predicted the nature of older adults' personal social networks. Our study leveraged comprehensive measures of general cognition (executive function, episodic memory), social cognition (face memory and dynamic measures of cognitive and affective theory of mind), and a rigorous measure of personal social networks from 143 community-dwelling older adults. We found that, when modeled together and controlling for sociodemographic variables, only executive function and dynamic cognitive theory of mind positively predicted having social networks with relatively unfamiliar, loosely connected others, accounting for 17% of the unique variance in older adults' social connectedness. Interestingly, having a social network comprised primarily of close, tightly knit relationships was negatively associated with affective theory of mind performance. Findings are discussed in the context of the social-cognitive resource framework-which suggests that social cognition may be more engaged in relatively unfamiliar, versus close, interactions. Specifically, our results show that social-cognitive processes may be relatively automatic for individuals whose primary social relationships are very close but may be more strongly engaged for individuals whose interactions include at least some relatively less close relationships. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Investigating the relationship of theory of mind and empathy with neuroimaging, neuropsychological, and neuropsychiatric data in persons with multiple sclerosis.

Theory of Mind (ToM) is understanding others' minds. Empathy is an insight into emotions and feelings of others. Persons with multiple sclerosis (pwMS) may experience impairment in ToM and empathy. To investigate ToM, empathy, and their relationship with neuroimaging, neuropsychological, and neuropsychiatric data. 41 pwMS and 41 HC were assessed using RMET for ToM, EQ, BICAMS, HADS. Cortical and subcortical gray matter volumes were calculated with Freesurfer from 3T MRI scans. pwMS showed lower EQ scores (44.82 ± 11.9 vs 51.29 ± 9.18, p = 0.02) and worse RMET performance (22.37 ± 4.09 vs 24,47 ± 2.93, p = 0.011). Anxiety and depression were higher in pwMS. EQ correlated with subcortical (amygdala) and cortical (anterior cingulate) volumes. RMET correlated with cortical volumes (posterior cingulate, lingual). In regression analysis, amygdala volume was the single predictor of empathy performance (p = 0.041). There were no significant correlations between social cognitive tests and general cognition. A weak negative correlation was found between EQ and the level of anxiety (r = -0.342, p = 0.038) The present study indicates that pwMS have impairment on ToM and empathy. The performance of ToM and empathy in MS is linked to the volumes of critical brain areas involved in social cognition.