Differential Involvement of Somatosensory and Interoceptive Cortices during the Observation of Affective Touch
Differential Involvement of Somatosensory and Interoceptive Cortices during the Observation of Affective Touch
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DOI：
10.1162/jocn.2010.21551
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发表时间：
2011-07-01
影响因子：
3.2
通讯作者：
Gallese, Vittorio
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Ebisch, Sjoerd J. H.;Ferri, Francesca;Gallese, Vittorio
先前的研究表明，观察其他人的体感体验也会激活处理自己体感体验的大脑回路。然而，参与触觉处理初级阶段的皮质区域是否也参与观察到的触觉的情感后果的自动编码，以及它们在多大程度上显示了自我和他人的体感体验的重叠激活，目前尚不清楚。为了研究这些问题，在目前的功能磁共振成像研究中，健康的参与者要么体验触摸，要么观看描述其他人的无生命和有生命/社会触摸体验的视频。从本质上讲，可以区分触觉加工的外感受成分和内感受成分，它们分别涉及物理刺激特征和内部感觉状态。与这一区别相一致的是，与中性的无生命接触相比，仅通过对他人的社会或情感皮肤体验的视觉感知，在后脑岛发现了一种特定的负调节。另一方面，第二体感区和后颞上区在最强烈的刺激下激活最强，似乎更依赖于观察到的物理刺激特征。与在体感觉区域检测到的替代激活相反，触摸体验（积极调节）和观察（消极调节）的相反激活模式表明，后脑岛并不反映自我和他人体验的共同表征。后脑岛嵌入在支撑身体自我感觉的分布式大脑区域网络中，当涉及情感体验时，它似乎可以区分自我和其他条件。
Previous studies suggested that the observation of other individuals' somatosensory experiences also activates brain circuits processing one's own somatosensory experiences. However, it is unclear whether cortical regions involved with the elementary stages of touch processing are also involved in the automatic coding of the affective consequences of observed touch and to which extent they show overlapping activation for somatosensory experiences of self and others. In order to investigate these issues, in the present fMRI study, healthy participants either experienced touch or watched videos depicting other individuals' inanimate and animate/social touch experiences. Essentially, a distinction can be made between exteroceptive and interoceptive components of touch processing, involved with physical stimulus characteristics and internal feeling states, respectively. Consistent with this distinction, a specific negative modulation was found in the posterior insula by the mere visual perception of other individuals' social or affective cutaneous experiences, compared to neutral inanimate touch. On the other hand, activation in secondary somatosensory and posterior superior temporal regions, strongest for the most intense stimuli, seemed more dependent on the observed physical stimulus characteristics. In contrast to the detected vicarious activation in somatosensory regions, opposite activation patterns for the experience (positive modulation) and observation (negative modulation) of touch suggest that the posterior insula does not reflect a shared representation of self and others' experiences. Embedded in a distributed network of brain regions underpinning a sense of the bodily self, the posterior insula rather appears to differentiate between self and other conditions when affective experiences are implicated.