Sep 12, 2018 04:01 AM
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/...091118.php
EXCERPT: Giving up a kidney to a stranger requires a certain sense of selflessness, what's come to be known in social science as extraordinary altruism. University of Pennsylvania psychologist Kristin Brethel-Haurwitz wanted to understand the connection between this trait and empathy, specifically empathy for distress emotions.
Using fMRI scans, Brethel-Haurwitz and colleagues from Georgetown University discovered that these altruistic kidney donors were more sensitive to a stranger's fear and pain than a control group, with activation happening in a brain region called the anterior insula, which is key for emotions like pain and disgust. This research, published in Psychological Science, is the first to show a clear link between real-world altruism and empathy for the pain of strangers.
"This can be hard to study in a lab because it's based on self-reporting and inherently, in that process, there may be biases," says Brethel-Haurwitz, a postdoctoral fellow in Penn's Department of Psychology in the School of Arts and Sciences. "So we took this population of real-world altruists, people who have donated a kidney to a stranger, to try to better understand their empathic process."
It was important for the researchers to get at what Brethel-Haurwitz calls "pure human altruism," a selfless act taken without expectation of anything in return. Donating a kidney is costly and painful and as such altruistic kidney donors often get pushback, not praise, for giving their organ to someone they don't know. Also, the process is often anonymous and nonreciprocal, meaning they may never know or meet the organ recipient. These factors made the group a strong population for such work....
MORE: https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/...091118.php
EXCERPT: Giving up a kidney to a stranger requires a certain sense of selflessness, what's come to be known in social science as extraordinary altruism. University of Pennsylvania psychologist Kristin Brethel-Haurwitz wanted to understand the connection between this trait and empathy, specifically empathy for distress emotions.
Using fMRI scans, Brethel-Haurwitz and colleagues from Georgetown University discovered that these altruistic kidney donors were more sensitive to a stranger's fear and pain than a control group, with activation happening in a brain region called the anterior insula, which is key for emotions like pain and disgust. This research, published in Psychological Science, is the first to show a clear link between real-world altruism and empathy for the pain of strangers.
"This can be hard to study in a lab because it's based on self-reporting and inherently, in that process, there may be biases," says Brethel-Haurwitz, a postdoctoral fellow in Penn's Department of Psychology in the School of Arts and Sciences. "So we took this population of real-world altruists, people who have donated a kidney to a stranger, to try to better understand their empathic process."
It was important for the researchers to get at what Brethel-Haurwitz calls "pure human altruism," a selfless act taken without expectation of anything in return. Donating a kidney is costly and painful and as such altruistic kidney donors often get pushback, not praise, for giving their organ to someone they don't know. Also, the process is often anonymous and nonreciprocal, meaning they may never know or meet the organ recipient. These factors made the group a strong population for such work....
MORE: https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/...091118.php