Article Figures & Data
Figures
- Figure 1.
fMRI donation task and behavior. A, In each trial, participants were presented with a mission statement of a real-life charity (reading phase, up to 30 s). Subsequently, a continuous rating scale (€0 to €50) was presented, and participants were asked to decide how much of their endowment of €50 they were willing to donate (decision phase, up to 10 s). Intertrial intervals varied from 4 to 8 s. B, Histogram of participants' average donations (range of €6.69 to €37.68; mean ± SD: €22.30 ± 9.09), confirming considerable variations in participants' average generosity. C, Taking advantage of the variability of generosity across trials, we defined high and low donations for each participant based on their average donation. Graph represents mean ± SD for individuals' high and low donations used to decode participants' generous and selfish giving decisions from neural response patterns. D, Stimuli were selected based on independent behavioral pretests. Graph represents mean ± SD of donations to each charity for the fMRI sample. Substantial variations in donations to each charity ensured that neural decoding of generosity did not merely reflect properties of individual stimuli.
- Figure 2.
Neural decoding of generous donations and of stimulus-driven reorienting of attention. A, A whole-brain searchlight decoding approach was used to identify neural signatures that reliably encoded participants' generous and selfish giving decisions across participants (p < 0.05, FWE-corrected at voxel level, k > 5 voxels). For details, see Table 2. B, Post hoc permutation tests further illustrated that decoding accuracies in predictive brain regions (displayed as triangles), based on response patterns of all voxels in a cluster, are unlikely achieved by chance (all p values <0.007). Boxplots represent null distributions of classification accuracies in the cluster across 1000 permutations. Central marks of boxplots indicate medians, which were found to be 50% (chance level) for all clusters. Edges of boxes indicate the 25th–75th percentiles. Whiskers extend to extreme data points. C, Cluster in the right TPJ/pSTS that encoded (nonsocial) stimulus-driven reorienting of attention (displayed in turquoise) in a whole-brain searchlight analysis (within attention task decoding, p < 0.05, FWE-corrected at voxel level, k > 5 voxels). The predictive cluster overlapped with two clusters in the right TPJ and pSTS that predicted generous and selfish donations in a separate donation task (displayed in orange, within donation task decoding, see A). D, ROI-based cross-task decoding examined whether neural responses that encode attention shifts are reactivated during generous donation decisions. Activation patterns in the right pSTS coding for stimulus-driven attention shifts contained significant information on generous giving decisions (illustrated by triangle, p < 0.05, corrected, permutation test). This finding suggests that the domain-general process of reorienting of attention toward (socially relevant) stimuli may account for part of the predictive information in the pSTS in the donation task. No evidence for shared neural code was found for the TPJ cluster (p > 0.05). Graph represents cross-task decoding accuracies in both clusters (triangles) and for cluster-based null-distributions (1000 permutations). Boxplots represent medians and 25th–75th percentiles. Whiskers indicate ranges of decoding accuracies.
- Figure 3.
Neural decoding of empathy and perspective taking for beneficiaries of charities. Left, Data are mean ± SD for participants' (A) empathy and (B) degree of perspective taking across donation trials as reported after scanning, indicating participants' engagement in both processes and comparable degrees of variance. C, During donation decisions, empathy for beneficiaries was encoded in response patterns in the right AI (red), but not in the right TPJ (p < 0.05, FWE-corrected). Pairwise comparisons confirmed that predictive information on empathic responses in AI was significantly higher than those in TPJ (p = 0.002) that varied around chance. D, The degree to which participants represented the perspective of the charities' beneficiaries was encoded in the right TPJ (green), but not the right AI (p < 0.05, FWE-corrected). Information on perspective taking in the TPJ was significantly higher than those decoded from the AI that varied around chance (p = 0.008). Graphs represent median predictive accuracies (white bar) achieved in the right AI and TPJ. Boxes represent the 25th–75th percentiles. Whiskers indicate range of multivariate regression accuracies. *p < 0.01.
- Figure 4.
Neural decoding of the relative influence of empathy and perspective taking in donation decisions. A, Neural signatures for perspective taking obtained in an independent fMRI task (EmpaToM) predicted the relative weight of perspective taking as input into donation decisions (βperspective taking) (mean Fisher z-transformed r = 0.34, p < 0.001, Bonferroni corrected), but not of empathy (r = −0.001, p > 0.05, corrected). Graphs represent median predictive accuracies (white bar) achieved in these cross-subject decoding analyses (SVR). Boxes represent the 25th–75th percentiles. B, Independent empathy-related neural signatures (EmpaToM) reliably predicted the degree to which participants relied on affective empathy during donation decisions (βempathy) (r = 0.16, p < 0.001, corrected), but not contributions of cognitive perspective taking (βperspective taking) that varied around chance (r = −0.04, p > 0.05, corrected). *p < 0.001.
Tables
Brain region Side BA T k MNI x y z mPFC L/R 10/32 5.92 12 0 50 16 dlPFC L 46 7.20 529 −26 46 22 SFS R 46/9 5.81 6 26 52 32 AI R 6.23 108 42 24 0 Mid temporal gyrus R 21 6.38 13 46 −2 −20 Inferior temporal gyrus R 20 6.07 14 56 −10 −28 TPJ R 39/40/22 6.04 20 56 −54 34 pSTS R 39 6.28 17 38 −66 26 Visual cortex/cerebellum L 18/19 8.96 2351 −14 −62 0 R 18/19 7.29 322 14 −72 2 ↵aResults are reported at a statistical threshold of p < 0.05, FWE-corrected for multiple comparisons at voxel level (cluster threshold of 5 voxels); only peak activations of clusters are reported. L, Left hemisphere, R, right hemisphere; BA, Brodmann area; k, cluster size in voxels.
Brain region Side BA T k MNI x y z mPFC/dlPFC/SFS R/L 9/10/32/46 9.63 8595 20 36 32 Ventromedal PFC L 11 6.23 23 −6 36 −8 Inferior frontal gyrus/AI R 47 6.16 33 38 40 −2 Inferior frontal gyrus/AI R 44 5.90 23 50 10 12 Inferior/mid temporal gyrus R 20/21 6.98 77 54 −38 −12 TPJ R 39/40/22 5.78 28 60 −56 30 Precentral gyrus L 6 5.88 14 −32 0 46 Superior frontal gyrus/SMA R 6/8 6.19 104 38 6 66 Superior frontal gyrus/SMA R 6 5.71 11 24 0 68 Visual cortex/cerebellum (VC) R 19 6.13 338 22 −86 28 VC/precuneus/superior parietal cortex R/L 7/18/19/39/40 9.41 7107 6 −70 52 ↵aResults are reported at a statistical threshold of p < 0.05, FWE-corrected for multiple comparisons at voxel level (cluster threshold of 5 voxels); only peak coordinates of clusters are reported. L, Left hemisphere; R, right hemisphere; BA, Brodmann area; k, cluster size in voxels; SMA, supplemental motor area.
Brain region Side BA T k MNI x y z mPFC L/R 10/32 4.37 6 2 50 18 dlPFC L 46 4.52 85 −32 58 26 SFS R 46/9 5.40 6 28 52 34 AI R 4.82 14 44 22 2 Visual cortex/cerebellum L 18/19 5.20 194 −14 −62 0 Visual cortex R 19 7.05 52 28 −80 36 Visual cortex L/R 18 3.68 15 4 −78 28 ↵aResults are reported at a statistical threshold of p < 0.05, FWE-corrected for multiple comparisons at voxel level (cluster threshold of 5 voxels); only peak coordinates of clusters are reported. L, Left hemisphere; R, right hemisphere; BA, Brodmann area; k, cluster size in voxels.
- Table 5.
Independent empathy and perspective taking responses (EmpaToM task) used as input for cross-subject decoding analysesa
Brain region Side BA T k MNI x y z Perspective taking (ToM > noToM) mPFC L/R 10/9 6.99 236 −9 56 31 TPJ L 22/39 5.73 177 −48 −52 28 STS L 21/20 4.82 67 −51 −25 −5 STS R 21/20 5.84 137 45 −28 −2 Temporal pole R 20/21/38 7.19 75 45 14 −35 Temporal pole L 20/21/38 4.86 19 −48 5 −29 Empathy (high > low emotional) AI L 4.62 18 −30 23 −17 Inferior frontal gyrus R 47 5.00 56 48 47 −11 Supramarginal gyrus L 40 5.27 45 −54 −55 40 ↵aResults are reported at a statistical threshold of p < 0.05, FWE-corrected; only peak activations of clusters are reported. L, Left hemisphere; R, right hemisphere; BA, Brodmann area; k, cluster size in voxels.
Brain region Side BA T k MNI x y z Mid frontal gyrus L 44 7.20 20 −44 12 34 Mid frontal gyrus/precentral gyrus R 44/6 6.97 8 40 4 32 Superior/mid temporal gyrus R 22/21 7.31 100 62 −44 8 TPJ/pSTS R 39 6.75 5 52 −62 32 Posterior cingulate cortex L/R 23 6.99 19 2 −28 34 Posterior cingulate cortex/paracentral lobe R 23/4 6.83 16 10 −32 50 Occipital cortex R 18/19 8.50 202 20 −88 20 L 19 7.87 87 −28 −62 28 L 19 6.96 9 −30 −80 4 L 18 6.68 5 −16 −76 28 ↵aResults are reported at a statistical threshold of p < 0.05, FWE-corrected for multiple comparisons at voxel level (cluster threshold of 5 voxels); only peak coordinates of clusters are reported. L, Left hemisphere; R, right hemisphere; BA, Brodmann area; k, cluster size in voxels.
