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      Frontal lobe contributions to theory of mind.

      Journal of cognitive neuroscience
      Adult, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Aphasia, Autistic Disorder, physiopathology, psychology, Brain Damage, Chronic, Brain Mapping, Cerebral Infarction, Dysarthria, Frontal Lobe, physiology, radiography, Functional Laterality, Humans, Memory, Middle Aged, Mind-Body Relations, Metaphysical, Models, Neurological, Models, Psychological, Social Behavior, Thinking, Tomography, X-Ray Computed

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          Abstract

          "Theory of mind," the ability to make inferences about others" mental states, seems to be a modular cognitive capacity that underlies humans" ability to engage in complex social interaction. It develops in several distinct stages, which can be measured with social reasoning tests of increasing difficulty. Individuals with Asperger"s syndrome, a mild form of autism, perform well on simpler theory of mind tests but show deficits on more developmentally advanced theory of mind tests. We tested patients with bilateral damage to orbito-frontal cortex (n = 5) and unilateral damage in left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (n = 5) on a series of theory of mind tasks varying in difficulty. Bilateral orbito-frontal lesion patients performed similarly to individuals with Asperger"s syndrome, performing well on simpler tests and showing deficits on tasks requiring more subtle social reasoning, such as the ability to recognize a faux pas. In contrast, no specific theory of mind deficits were evident in the unilateral dorsolateral frontal lesion patients. The dorsolateral lesion patients had difficulty only on versions of the tasks that placed demands on working memory.

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          Pretense and representation: The origins of "theory of mind."

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            A differential neural response in the human amygdala to fearful and happy facial expressions.

            The amygdala is thought to play a crucial role in emotional and social behaviour. Animal studies implicate the amygdala in both fear conditioning and face perception. In humans, lesions of the amygdala can lead to selective deficits in the recognition of fearful facial expressions and impaired fear conditioning, and direct electrical stimulation evokes fearful emotional responses. Here we report direct in vivo evidence of a differential neural response in the human amygdala to facial expressions of fear and happiness. Positron-emission tomography (PET) measures of neural activity were acquired while subjects viewed photographs of fearful or happy faces, varying systematically in emotional intensity. The neuronal response in the left amygdala was significantly greater to fearful as opposed to happy expressions. Furthermore, this response showed a significant interaction with the intensity of emotion (increasing with increasing fearfulness, decreasing with increasing happiness). The findings provide direct evidence that the human amygdala is engaged in processing the emotional salience of faces, with a specificity of response to fearful facial expressions.
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              “John thinks that Mary thinks that…” attribution of second-order beliefs by 5- to 10-year-old children

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