Thinking about actions: the neural substrates of person knowledge

Despite an extensive literature on the neural substrates of semantic knowledge, how person-related information is represented in the brain has yet to be elucidated. Accordingly, in the present study we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate the neural correlates of person knowledge. Focusing on the neural substrates of action knowledge, participants reported whether or not a common set of behaviors could be performed by people or dogs. While dogs and people are capable of performing many of the same actions (e.g. run, sit, bite), we surmised that the representation of this knowledge would be associated with distinct patterns of neural activity. Specifically, person judgments were expected to activate cortical areas associated with theory of mind (ToM) reasoning. The results supported this prediction. Whereas action-related judgments about dogs were associated with activity in various regions, including the occipital and parahippocampal gyri; identical judgments about people yielded activity in areas of prefrontal cortex, notably the right middle and medial frontal gyri. These findings suggest that person knowledge may be functionally dissociable from comparable information about other animals, with action-related judgments about people recruiting neural activity that is indicative of ToM reasoning.     

《黄帝内经》对医学心理学的论述

《黄帝内经》论述了神、魂、魄、意、志、思、虑、智、情与人的生命、生理及人的身心健康关系 ,对身心发展规律和保健养生方法也有精辟论述 ,这些朴素的医学心理学思想反映了中国医家自古就有崇尚科学的精神 ,其系统而综合的论述自然、人体、脏腑功能、精神情绪活动等之间关系的方法论 ,反映了古人的思维具有较强的哲学思辩性。     

Understanding of Thought Bubbles as Mental Representations in Children with Autism: Implications for Theory of Mind

Standard false belief tasks indicate that normally developing children do not fully develop a theory of mind until the age of 4 years and that children with autism have an impaired theory of mind. Recent evidence, however, suggests that children as young as 3 years of age understand that thought bubbles depict mental representations and that these can be false. Twelve normally developing children and 11 children with autism were tested on a standard false belief task and a number of tasks that employed thought bubbles to represent mental states. While the majority of normally developing children and children with autism failed the standard false belief task, they understood that (i) thought bubbles represent thought, (ii) thought bubbles can be used to infer an unknown reality, (iii) thoughts can be different, and (iv) thoughts can be false. These results indicate that autistic children with a relatively low verbal mental age may be capable of understanding mental representations.     

Cortical Activations during judgments about the self and an other person

Self-related thought and other person related thought have received a great deal of study in recent years, but have seldom been examined in the same experiment. This study used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to compare the neural correlates of judgments of ones own preferences with judgments of another person's preferences. Each participant viewed food names and made one of three decisions: self (whether he or she liked the food); other (whether a specific friend liked the food), or letter (whether there were more than two vowels in the food name). Self and other decisions both activated bilateral medial areas of the frontal and parietal lobes and the bilateral insula in comparison to the letter task. Self activated superior medial parietal areas in comparison to other, whereas other led to greater activation in inferior medial parietal and left lateral frontal areas than self. These results indicate that the neural networks underlying self processing and other person processing may share common neural substrates, particularly regions associated with representation of the body and mental states.     

The cost of understanding other people: social cognition predicts young children's sensitivity to criticism

BACKGROUND: Individual differences in sensitivity to teacher criticism, and their links with individual differences in social cognition, were examined in 141 young children from diverse family backgrounds. METHODS: Children's sensitivity to teacher criticism was assessed in their first year of school (mean age 5.13 years), using a puppet scenario in which a teacher criticises the child for making an error in school work. Understanding of false belief and mixed emotions was assessed at the same time. One hundred and thirteen of the children had been seen one year earlier in preschool, when comprehensive assessments were made of false belief and emotion understanding. RESULTS: Individual differences were apparent in children's sensitivity to teacher criticism, which were correlated with individual differences in both preschool and concurrent social cognition: children with more advanced social cognition were more sensitive to teacher criticism. Regression analyses showed that preschool social cognition was especially important, explaining unique variance in sensitivity to criticism over and above variance accounted for by concurrent sociocognitive ability. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that there are costs as well as benefits to understanding other people, at least for young children, and that individual differences in early social cognition may have distinct developmental trajectories. These issues, along with implications for research into children's responses to criticism and failure, are discussed.     

Exploring the cognitive phenotype of autism: weak "central coherence" in parents and siblings of children with autism: II. Real-life skills and preferences

Information on everyday life activities and preferences in both social and nonsocial domains was obtained from parents and children who had taken part in an experimental study of central coherence. Comparisons were made between parents who had a son with autism, parents with a dyslexic son, and families without a history of developmental disorder, as well as the male siblings in these families. Data on everyday preferences and abilities were elicited by means of an experimental questionnaire. Significant group differences in social and nonsocial preferences were found, suggesting that some parents showed similarities with their son with autism, in preference for nonsocial activities and ability in detail-focused processing. A similar experimental questionnaire, completed by parents on behalf of their sons, discriminated between autism group probands and controls, but did not differentiate sibling groups. The relevance of the nonsocial items to central coherence is discussed in the light of the findings in Part I: autism parents who reported more autism-related nonsocial (but not social) preferences, tended to show a piecemeal processing style on the experimental tasks.     

Did Consciousness Evolve from Self-Paced Probing of the Environment, and Not from Reflexes?

It is suggested that the anatomical structures whichmediate consciousness evolved as decisiveembellishments to a (non-conscious) design strategypresent even in the simplest monocellular organisms.Consciousness is thus not the pinnacle of ahierarchy whose base is the primitive reflex, becausereflexes require a nervous system, which the monocelldoes not possess. By postulating that consciousness isintimately connected to self-paced probing of theenvironment, also prominent in prokaryotic behavior,one can make mammalian neuroanatomy amenable todramatically simple rationalization.     

首发抑郁症患者的心灵理论认知障碍

目的探讨首发抑郁症患者心灵理论两成分加工的特点。方法采用眼区心理状态阅读任务和失言觉察任务分别测查56例首发抑郁症患者和55名正常对照心灵理论社会知觉加工和社会认知加工的能力,患者又分为有和无精神病性症状组(PD组和NPD组)。采用贝克抑郁自评量表和简明精神病量表评估患者的临床症状。结果患者组心理状态阅读成绩(t=7.42,P<0.01)和失言觉察问题得分(t=13.57,P<0.01)显著差于对照组。而PD组(n=23)、NPD组(n=33)和对照组3组间心理状态阅读成绩(F=33.08,P<0.01)和失言觉察得分(2=78.50,P<0.01)差异也有统计学意义,两两比较显示,在两种任务情况下PD组和NPD组均差于对照组(P<0.05)。以贝克抑郁量表评分为协变量的协方差分析进一步显示,PD组在两种任务下的得分均差于NPD组(P<0.01)。患者组心理状态阅读成绩和失言觉察问题得分分别与BPRS总分(r=-0.36,P<0.01;r=-0.48,P<0.01)和敌对因子分(r=-0.73,P<0.01;r=-0.77,P<0.01)呈显著负相关。结论抑郁症患者在心灵理论加工的两个亚成分上均存在损害,且与精神病性症状及其严重程度相关。     

浅论“心主神明”

从神明的含义,心主神明的理论来源、心的功能定位和物质基础等方面来阐释心主神明理论的正确性.     

铝暴露对大鼠记忆学习的影响及其机制研究

[目的]通过观察慢性铝暴露后大鼠学习记忆行为学、神经生化（ERK含量、磷酸化水平）指标变化，探讨铝影响学习记忆的作用机制，并为中医学“脑主神明”理论提供实验依据。[方法]给大鼠自由饮用不同剂量AlCl3水溶液的方法实行铝暴露，观察大鼠圆形Morris水迷宫学习记忆的行为学表现，蛋白免疫印迹（Western—Blot）方法测定各组细胞外信号调节激酶（ERK1／2）活性及含量变化。[结果]对照组、低剂量组、高剂量组的行为学表现和Western—Blot ERK表达比较有显著差异（P〈0．05）。[结论]中医学“脑主神明”理论是正确的而且铝暴露可以影响大鼠的学习记忆。