Understanding self and others: from origins to disorders

Starting from a neurobiological standpoint, I will propose that our capacity to understand others as intentional agents, far from being exclusively dependent upon mentalistic/linguistic abilities, be deeply grounded in the relational nature of our interactions with the world. According to this hypothesis, an implicit, prereflexive form of understanding of other individuals is based on the strong sense of identity binding us to them. We share with our conspecifics a multiplicity of states that include actions, sensations and emotions. A new conceptual tool able to capture the richness of the experiences we share with others will be introduced: the shared manifold of intersubjectivity. I will posit that it is through this shared manifold that it is possible for us to recognize other human beings as similar to us. It is just because of this shared manifold that intersubjective communication and ascription of intentionality become possible. It will be argued that the same neural structures that are involved in processing and controlling executed actions, felt sensations and emotions are also active when the same actions, sensations and emotions are to be detected in others. It therefore appears that a whole range of different 'mirror matching mechanisms' may be present in our brain. This matching mechanism, constituted by mirror neurons originally discovered and described in the domain of action, could well be a basic organizational feature of our brain, enabling our rich and diversified intersubjective experiences. This perspective is in a position to offer a global approach to the understanding of the vulnerability to major psychoses such as schizophrenia.

Psychopathology, 2003

Starting from a neurobiological standpoint, I will propose that our capacity to understand others as intentional agents, far from being exclusively dependent upon mentalistic/linguistic abilities, be deeply grounded in the relational nature of our interactions with the world. According to this hypothesis, an implicit, prereflexive form of understanding of other individuals is based on the strong sense of identity binding us to them. We share with our conspecifics a multiplicity of states that include actions, sensations and emotions. A new conceptual tool able to capture the richness of the experiences we share with others will be introduced: the shared manifold of intersubjectivity. I will posit that it is through this shared manifold that it is possible for us to recognize other human beings as similar to us. It is just because of this shared manifold that intersubjective communication and ascription of intentionality become possible. It will be argued that the same neural structures that are involved in processing and controlling executed actions, felt sensations and emotions are also active when the same actions, sensations and emotions are to be detected in others. It therefore appears that a whole range of different 'mirror matching mechanisms' may be present in our brain. This matching mechanism, constituted by mirror neurons originally discovered and described in the domain of action, could well be a basic organizational feature of our brain, enabling our rich and diversified intersubjective experiences. This perspective is in a position to offer a global approach to the understanding of the vulnerability to major psychoses such as schizophrenia.

Philosophical Transactions of …, 2003

It has been proposed that the capacity to code the 'like me' analogy between self and others constitutes a basic prerequisite and a starting point for social cognition. It is by means of this self/other equivalence that meaningful social bonds can be established, that we can recognize others as similar to us, and that imitation can take place.

Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 1996

We consider the various criticisms and requests for clarification made by the commentators of our framework for understanding intentional relations. Our response is organized according to the main themes in the target article: general theory, phylogeny, development, and autism. We also add some discussion of further issues, such as simulation and moral theory, that were not addressed in the target article.

Consistent with and in extension of the "social brain hypothesis," I discuss the idea that the intuition of free will emerged during the course of primate social evolution. If, as the "social brain hypothesis" alleges, the main selective pressure among primates is on generating social knowledge about one's cooperators and competitors, then it is the knowledge about others and not the knowledge about oneself that is the scarce cognitive resource. It is beneficial to make the others predictable and to form hypotheses about their probable behavioral tendencies. This is done by behavior reading and mind reading and by classifying the recurring stochastic patterns in everyday language as the "will." Thus, the idea of free will emerged first as a social attribution and not as an introspectively gained insight.

2003

There is converging evidence from developmental and cognitive psychology, as well as from neuroscience, to suggest that the self is both special and social, and that self–other interaction is the driving force behind self-development. We review experimental findings which demonstrate that human infants are motivated for social interactions and suggest that the development of an awareness of other minds is rooted in the implicit notion that others are like the self.

Dialogues in clinical neuroscience, 2012

In the following article we present a view that social cognition and social neuroscience, as shaped by the current research paradigms, are not sufficient to improve our understanding of psychopathological phenomena. We hold that the self, self-awareness, and inter-subjectivity are integral to social perception and actions. In addition, we emphasize that the self and self-awareness are, by their very nature and function, involved over the entire lifespan with the way the individual is perceived in the social environment. Likewise, the modes of operation and identification of the self and self-awareness receive strong developmental contributions from social interactions with parental figures, siblings, peers, and significant others. These contributions are framed by a competitive and cooperative struggle for love and recognition. We suggest that in humans social cognitive neuroscience should be informed by a thoughtful appreciation of the equal significance of the struggle for "l...

Research on the neural bases of empathy has exploded in the past decade, potentially laying to rest a pervading and contentious debate about the nature of the phenomenon. Many studies have confirmed the existence of self-other overlap at the neural level, with the same regions activated when feeling and perceiving an affective state. However debate still continues on the extent to which this neural-level resonance underlies more subjective states such as emotional contagion, sympathy, perspective taking and helping. According to a perception-action view, neural overlap between self and other is simply an evolved, adaptive mechanism for understanding others that relies on activation of one’s own representations for action and experience. However, neural resonance is only necessary at the early stages of information processing and need not be consciously experienced. It can subsequently lead to a range of empathic states (emotional contagion, perspective taking, sympathy) depending on the context and the degree to which the observer relates to the situation at hand. This chapter outlines an organizational framework for understanding the interrelationship between neural and subjective resonance, and among various empathic phenomena through a dynamic systems view of how experiential information is processed in the brain and body.

2008

After defining “cognitive perspective taking” and “empathy” we will review the main results of neuroscientific studies of the human ability to understand other people's intentions, beliefs, and experiences. We will then present several fMRI studies investigating empathic brain responses elicited by the observation of others in pain and show how these empathic brain responses are modulated by several contextual and stimulus factors. We will integrate these results with findings on patients with Alexithymia (inability to understand and label distinct emotions and emotional experiences) and Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD; a neurological condition associated with a variety of social and linguistic deficits) to create a deeper understanding of the relations between interoceptive awareness, empathy, and cognitive perspective taking.

The cognitive neuroscience of social …, 2005