Are all beliefs equal?
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Are all beliefs equal? Implicit belief attributions recruiting core brain regions of theory of mind. / Kovács, Agnes Melinda; Kühn, Simone; Gergely, György; Csibra, Gergely; Brass, Marcel.
in: PLOS ONE, Jahrgang 9, Nr. 9, 2014, S. e106558.Publikationen: SCORING: Beitrag in Fachzeitschrift/Zeitung › SCORING: Zeitschriftenaufsatz › Forschung › Begutachtung
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Are all beliefs equal?
T2 - Implicit belief attributions recruiting core brain regions of theory of mind
AU - Kovács, Agnes Melinda
AU - Kühn, Simone
AU - Gergely, György
AU - Csibra, Gergely
AU - Brass, Marcel
PY - 2014
Y1 - 2014
N2 - Humans possess efficient mechanisms to behave adaptively in social contexts. They ascribe goals and beliefs to others and use these for behavioural predictions. Researchers argued for two separate mental attribution systems: an implicit and automatic one involved in online interactions, and an explicit one mainly used in offline deliberations. However, the underlying mechanisms of these systems and the types of beliefs represented in the implicit system are still unclear. Using neuroimaging methods, we show that the right temporo-parietal junction and the medial prefrontal cortex, brain regions consistently found to be involved in explicit mental state reasoning, are also recruited by spontaneous belief tracking. While the medial prefrontal cortex was more active when both the participant and another agent believed an object to be at a specific location, the right temporo-parietal junction was selectively activated during tracking the false beliefs of another agent about the presence, but not the absence of objects. While humans can explicitly attribute to a conspecific any possible belief they themselves can entertain, implicit belief tracking seems to be restricted to beliefs with specific contents, a content selectivity that may reflect a crucial functional characteristic and signature property of implicit belief attribution.
AB - Humans possess efficient mechanisms to behave adaptively in social contexts. They ascribe goals and beliefs to others and use these for behavioural predictions. Researchers argued for two separate mental attribution systems: an implicit and automatic one involved in online interactions, and an explicit one mainly used in offline deliberations. However, the underlying mechanisms of these systems and the types of beliefs represented in the implicit system are still unclear. Using neuroimaging methods, we show that the right temporo-parietal junction and the medial prefrontal cortex, brain regions consistently found to be involved in explicit mental state reasoning, are also recruited by spontaneous belief tracking. While the medial prefrontal cortex was more active when both the participant and another agent believed an object to be at a specific location, the right temporo-parietal junction was selectively activated during tracking the false beliefs of another agent about the presence, but not the absence of objects. While humans can explicitly attribute to a conspecific any possible belief they themselves can entertain, implicit belief tracking seems to be restricted to beliefs with specific contents, a content selectivity that may reflect a crucial functional characteristic and signature property of implicit belief attribution.
KW - Adolescent
KW - Adult
KW - Brain
KW - Brain Mapping
KW - Culture
KW - Female
KW - Humans
KW - Magnetic Resonance Imaging
KW - Male
KW - Theory of Mind
KW - Young Adult
U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0106558
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0106558
M3 - SCORING: Journal article
C2 - 25259625
VL - 9
SP - e106558
JO - PLOS ONE
JF - PLOS ONE
SN - 1932-6203
IS - 9
ER -
