0000000000583227
AUTHOR
Riitta Hari
Brain and behavioral alterations in subjects with social anxiety dominated by empathic embarrassment
Significance People are increasingly affected by social anxiety that includes emotional hypersensitivity and inaccurate interpretation of social encounters, and varies markedly in its subjective manifestations. We searched for insights into the underlying neurocognitive mechanisms of Taijin-kyofusho (TKS), a specific subtype of social-anxiety disorder common in East Asia and dominated by empathic or other-oriented embarrassment. We found TKS to be characterized by enhanced affective and reduced cognitive empathy. Moreover, analysis of functional MRI data—collected while subjects viewed videos of badly singing people—revealed disruption of the cognitive–empathy network, possibly obstructing …
Functional Brain Segmentation Using Inter-Subject Correlation in fMRI
The human brain continuously processes massive amounts of rich sensory information. To better understand such highly complex brain processes, modern neuroimaging studies are increasingly utilizing experimental setups that better mimic daily‐life situations. A new exploratory data‐analysis approach, functional segmentation inter‐subject correlation analysis (FuSeISC), was proposed to facilitate the analysis of functional magnetic resonance (fMRI) data sets collected in these experiments. The method provides a new type of functional segmentation of brain areas, not only characterizing areas that display similar processing across subjects but also areas in which processing across subjects is h…