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Science 20 February 2004:
Vol. 303. no. 5661, pp. 1157 - 1162
DOI: 10.1126/science.1093535
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Research Articles

Empathy for Pain Involves the Affective but not Sensory Components of Pain

Tania Singer,1* Ben Seymour,1 John O'Doherty,1 Holger Kaube,2 Raymond J. Dolan,1 Chris D. Frith1

Our ability to have an experience of another's pain is characteristic of empathy. Using functional imaging, we assessed brain activity while volunteers experienced a painful stimulus and compared it to that elicited when they observed a signal indicating that their loved one—present in the same room—was receiving a similar pain stimulus. Bilateral anterior insula (AI), rostral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), brainstem, and cerebellum were activated when subjects received pain and also by a signal that a loved one experienced pain. AIand ACC activation correlated with individual empathy scores. Activity in the posterior insula/secondary somatosensory cortex, the sensorimotor cortex (SI/MI), and the caudal ACC was specific to receiving pain. Thus, a neural response in AIand rostral ACC, activated in common for "self" and "other" conditions, suggests that the neural substrate for empathic experience does not involve the entire "pain matrix." We conclude that only that part of the pain network associated with its affective qualities, but not its sensory qualities, mediates empathy.

1 Wellcome Department of Imaging Neuroscience, Institute of Neurology, University College of London, 12 Queen Square, WC1N 3AR London, UK.
2 Headache Group, Institute of Neurology, University College of London, Queen Square, WC1N 3BG London, UK.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: t.singer{at}fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)