The relationship between dispositional self-construal and empathy foringroup and outgroup members’ pain: evidence from ERPs

Ingroup favoritism on perceived risk of infectious diseases

Humans live in social groups; thus, infectious diseases may threaten human health and safety. Do individuals exhibit ingroup favoritism or ingroup devaluation when faced with varying risks of infectious diseases? We generated relatively realistic disease scenarios to examine this question. We reported the results from three experiments in which we tested individuals' perceived disease risk from ingroup and outgroup members under high- and low-risk conditions. Experiment 1 used a realistic influenza scenario, and Experiments 2 and 3 used a realistic scenario of exposure to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). All three experiments showed that perceived disease risk was significantly lower from ingroup members than from outgroup members and significantly lower in low-risk conditions than in high-risk conditions. Furthermore, the perceived disease risk was significantly lower from ingroup members than from outgroup members in high-risk conditions but did not significantly differ in low-risk conditions, as in Experiment 1's influenza scenario and Experiment 2's COVID-19 vaccination scenario. This suggests that ingroup favoritism is flexible. The results support ingroup favoritism and the functional flexibility principle in response to disease threats according to perceived disease risk.

Self-construal modulates context-based social comparison preferences in outcome evaluations

Self-construal (SC) describes how people perceive the relationship between themselves and others and is usually divided into interdependent and independent types. Several studies have been conducted on how people with independent and interdependent SC process their own and others' outcomes. However, few studies have investigated the influence of SC on outcome evaluation in a social comparison context. To explore this, we randomly assigned participants to interdependent and independent SC priming groups and analyzed the affects and electrophysiological responses generated when they played gambling games with two pseudo-players. The results showed that self-gambling state, SC, and social comparison interacted to influence feedback-related negativity (FRN). In the self-win condition, performances that differed from others elicited more negative FRN than evenness for both the interdependent and independent groups. In the self-loss condition, this effect was only found in the independent group. These results suggest that the outcome evaluation patterns in social contexts are not fixed but vary according to self-gambling state and SC.

Development of social feedback processing and responses in childhood: an fMRI test-replication design in two age cohorts

This study investigated behavioral and neural correlates underlying social feedback processing and subsequent aggressive behaviors in childhood in two age cohorts (test sample: n = 509/n = 385 and replication sample: n = 354/n = 195, 7-9 years old). Using a previously validated Social Network Aggression Task, we showed that negative social feedback resulted in most behavioral aggression, followed by less aggression after neutral and least aggression after positive feedback. Receiving positive and negative social feedback was associated with increased activity in the insula, medial prefrontal cortex and ventrolateral prefrontal cortex. Responding to feedback was associated with additional activation in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) following positive feedback. This DLPFC activation correlated negatively with aggression. Furthermore, age analyses showed that older children showed larger reductions in aggression following positive feedback and more neural activation in the DLPFC when responding to positive feedback compared to younger children. To assess the robustness of our results, we examined these processes in two independent behavioral/functional magnetic resonance imaging samples using equivalence testing, thereby contributing to replicable reports. Together, these findings demonstrate an important role of social saliency and regulatory processes where regulation of aggression rapidly develops between the ages of 7 and 9 years.

Face beauty or soul beauty? The influence of facial attractiveness and moral judgment on pain empathy

Previous studies indicated that both facial attractiveness (face beauty) and moral judgment (soul beauty) would impact the responses to others’ pain, however, the effects from facial attractiveness were in controversial. Furthermore, whether facial attractiveness would increase or decrease the effects of moral judgment on pain empathy were still unknown. Based on the videos in which actors with high versus low facial attractiveness under pain or non-pain conditions, study 1 recruited 26 undergraduates to assess the effects of facial attractiveness on participants’ pain intensity rating scores. Then study 2 recruited 85 undergraduates to examine the effects of facial attractiveness and moral judgment on pain empathy by assessing pain intensity and self-uncomfortableness rating scores. Study 1 found that participants rated higher pain intensity scores to actors with high facial attractiveness compared to low facial attractive actors under pain condition. Study 2 found that participants showed higher pain empathic responses for actors with high moral judgment, no matter their facial attractiveness were high or low. For actors with low moral judgment under pain condition, participants showed higher pain empathy to those with high facial attractiveness compared to those with low facial attractiveness. In conclusion, facial attractiveness could facilitate the empathy responses for other’s pain. High facial attractiveness would increase the pain empathic responses to individuals with low moral judgment, however, low facial attractiveness would not decrease the pain empathic responses to individuals with high moral judgment.