TY - JOUR
T1 - The role of medial prefrontal cortex in theory of mind
T2 - A deep rTMS study
AU - Krause, Laura
AU - Enticott, Peter G.
AU - Zangen, Abraham
AU - Fitzgerald, Paul B.
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank Mrs. Hayley Kennedy for assistance with data collection, Ms. Bernadette Fitzgibbon, Ms. Sara Arnold, and Dr. Stuart Lee for their comments on the manuscript, and those who kindly agreed to take part in the study. Thank you to Dr. Simone Shamay-Tsoory for providing the Yoni task. Peter G. Enticottt is supported by a Clinical Research Fellowship from the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) of Australia . Paul B. Fitzgerald is supported by a Practitioner Fellowship from the NHMRC . Part of the equipment used to provide deep repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation was provided to Paul B. Fitzgerald by Brainsway Inc (Jerusalem, Israel), a company that develops nonsurgical equipment for deep transcranial magnetic stimulation. Abraham Zangen has financial interest in Brainsway Inc.
PY - 2012/3/1
Y1 - 2012/3/1
N2 - Neuroimaging studies suggest that the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) plays a central role in cognitive theory of mind (ToM). This can be assessed more definitively, however, using repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS). Sixteen healthy participants (10 females, 6 males) completed tasks assessing cognitive and affective ToM following low-frequency deep rTMS to bilateral mPFC in active-stimulation and placebo-stimulation sessions. There was no effect of deep rTMS on either cognitive or affective ToM performance. When examining self-reported empathy, however, there was evidence for a double dissociation: deep rTMS disrupted affective ToM performance for those with high self-reported empathy, but improved affective ToM performance for those with low self-reported empathy. mPFC appears to play a role in affective ToM processing, but the present study suggest that stimulation outcomes are dependent on baseline empathic abilities.
AB - Neuroimaging studies suggest that the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) plays a central role in cognitive theory of mind (ToM). This can be assessed more definitively, however, using repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS). Sixteen healthy participants (10 females, 6 males) completed tasks assessing cognitive and affective ToM following low-frequency deep rTMS to bilateral mPFC in active-stimulation and placebo-stimulation sessions. There was no effect of deep rTMS on either cognitive or affective ToM performance. When examining self-reported empathy, however, there was evidence for a double dissociation: deep rTMS disrupted affective ToM performance for those with high self-reported empathy, but improved affective ToM performance for those with low self-reported empathy. mPFC appears to play a role in affective ToM processing, but the present study suggest that stimulation outcomes are dependent on baseline empathic abilities.
KW - Empathy
KW - Medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC)
KW - Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS)
KW - Theory of mind (ToM)
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=83655169815&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.bbr.2011.11.037
DO - 10.1016/j.bbr.2011.11.037
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:83655169815
SN - 0166-4328
VL - 228
SP - 87
EP - 90
JO - Behavioural Brain Research
JF - Behavioural Brain Research
IS - 1
ER -