Abstract
The present study investigated whether and how self-construal priming influences empathic neural responses to others' emotional states. We recorded event-related brain potentials to stimuli depicting the hands of unknown others experiencing painful or non-painful events from Chinese and Western participants after they had been primed in three conditions (independent self-construal priming, interdependent self-construal priming, and a control condition). Stimuli depicting painful events (as opposed to non-painful ones) elicited a positive shift of the fronto-central activity at 232-332 ms and of the central-parietal activity at 440-740 ms in the control condition. Moreover, neural responses to stimuli depicting painful (vs. non-painful) situations at 232-332 ms were decreased by interdependent self-construal priming among Chinese and by independent self-construal priming among Westerners. Our findings suggest that self-construal priming modulates sensitivity to perceived pain in unknown others and that this effect varies with culture.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 130-138 |
Number of pages | 9 |
Journal | Social Neuroscience |
Volume | 9 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Mar 2014 |
Keywords
- Culture
- ERP
- Empathy
- Pain
- Self-construal
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Social Psychology
- Development
- Behavioral Neuroscience