title: The dorsomedial prefrontal cortex plays a causal role in mediating in-group advantage in emotion recognition: A TMS study.
abstract: Consistent evidence suggests that emotional facial expressions are better recognized when the expresser and the perceiver belong to the same social group (in-group advantage). In this study, we used transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to investigate the possible causal involvement of the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC) and of the right temporo-parietal junction (TPJ), two main nodes of the mentalizing neural network, in mediating the in-group advantage in emotion recognition. Participants performed an emotion discrimination task in a minimal (blue/green) group paradigm. We found that interfering with activity in the dmPFC significantly interfered with the effect of minimal group-membership on emotion recognition, reducing participants' ability to discriminate emotions expressed by in-group members. In turn, rTPJ mainly affected emotion discrimination per se, irrespective of group membership. Overall, our results point to a causal role of the dmPFC in mediating the in-group advantage in emotion recognition, favoring intragroup communication.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan 20126, Italy; Milan Center for Neuroscience, Milan 20126, Italy.
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Gamond
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milan 20126, Italy; Brain Connectivity Center, C. Mondino National Neurological Institute, Pavia, Italy. Electronic address: zaira.cattaneo@unimib.it.
authors.forename: Z
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Cattaneo
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D000066499:Facial Recognition / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006126:Group Processes; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time; D021641:Recognition, Psychology / Q000502:physiology*; D012938:Social Perception; D050781:Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Emotion recognition; In-group advantage; Medial prefrontal cortex; Minimal group; TMS; Temporo-parietal junction