Doing the right thing: a common neural circuit for appropriate violent or compassionate behavior.
Humans have a considerable facility to adapt their behavior in a manner that is appropriate to social or societal context. A failure of this ability can lead to social exclusion and is a feature of disorders such as psychopathy and disruptive behavior disorder. We investigated the neural basis of this ability using a customized video game played by 12 healthy participants in an fMRI scanner. Two conditions involved extreme examples of context-appropriate action: shooting an aggressive humanoid assailant or healing a passive wounded person. Two control conditions involved carefully matched stimuli paired with inappropriate actions: shooting the person or healing the assailant. Surprisingly, the same circuit, including the amygdala and ventromedial prefrontal cortex, was activated when participants acted in a context-appropriate manner, whether being compassionate towards an injured conspecific or aggressive towards a violent assailant. The findings indicate a common system that guides behavioral expression appropriate to social or societal context irrespective of its aggressive or compassionate nature.
King
John A
JA
Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Department of Anatomy, University College London, 17 Queen Square, London WC1N 3AR, UK. John.King@ucl.ac.uk
Blair
R James R
RJ
Mitchell
Derek G V
DG
Dolan
Raymond J
RJ
Burgess
Neil
N
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001519:Behavior / Q000941:ethics* / Q000502:physiology*; D004645:Empathy; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009415:Nerve Net / Q000502:physiology*; D014754:Violence / Q000941:ethics*