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Author Topic: Neural and cognitive characteristics of extraordinary altruists  (Read 4769 times)

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Offline Clark

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Neural and cognitive characteristics of extraordinary altruists
« on: September 20, 2014, 01:23:35 PM »
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2014/09/11/1408440111

Neural and cognitive characteristics of extraordinary altruists
Abigail A. Marsha,1, Sarah A. Stoycosa, Kristin M. Brethel-Haurwitza, Paul Robinsonb, John W. VanMeterc, and Elise M. Cardinalea
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Early Edition, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1408440111

Significance
Altruism, and particularly costly altruism toward strangers, such as altruistic kidney donation, represents a puzzling phenomenon for many fields of science, including evolutionary biology, psychology, and economics. How can such behavior be explained? The propensity to engage in costly altruism varies widely and may be genetically mediated, but little is known about the neural mechanisms that support it. We used structural and functional brain imaging to compare extraordinary altruists, specifically altruistic kidney donors, and controls. Altruists exhibited variations in neural anatomy and functioning that represent the inverse of patterns previously observed in psychopaths, who are unusually callous and antisocial. These findings suggest extraordinary altruism represents one end of a caring continuum and is supported by neural mechanisms that underlie social and emotional responsiveness.

Abstract

Altruistic behavior improves the welfare of another individual while reducing the altruist’s welfare. Humans’ tendency to engage in altruistic behaviors is unevenly distributed across the population, and individual variation in altruistic tendencies may be genetically mediated. Although neural endophenotypes of heightened or extreme antisocial behavior tendencies have been identified in, for example, studies of psychopaths, little is known about the neural mechanisms that support heightened or extreme prosocial or altruistic tendencies. In this study, we used structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging to assess a population of extraordinary altruists: altruistic kidney donors who volunteered to donate a kidney to a stranger. Such donations meet the most stringent definitions of altruism in that they represent an intentional behavior that incurs significant costs to the donor to benefit an anonymous, nonkin other. Functional imaging and behavioral tasks included face-emotion processing paradigms that reliably distinguish psychopathic individuals from controls. Here we show that extraordinary altruists can be distinguished from controls by their enhanced volume in right amygdala and enhanced responsiveness of this structure to fearful facial expressions, an effect that predicts superior perceptual sensitivity to these expressions. These results mirror the reduced amygdala volume and reduced responsiveness to fearful facial expressions observed in psychopathic individuals. Our results support the possibility of a neural basis for extraordinary altruism. We anticipate that these findings will expand the scope of research on biological mechanisms that promote altruistic behaviors to include neural mechanisms that support affective and social responsiveness.
Unrelated directed kidney donor in 2003, recipient and I both well.
620 time blood and platelet donor since 1976 and still giving!
Elected to the OPTN/UNOS Boards of Directors & Executive, Kidney Transplantation, and Ad Hoc Public Solicitation of Organ Donors Committees, 2005-2011
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Offline Fr Pat

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Re: Neural and cognitive characteristics of extraordinary altruists
« Reply #1 on: September 20, 2014, 06:53:07 PM »
       Just a thought: Weight-lifters have bigger muscles than non weight-lifters. Do people lift weights because they have larger muscles, or do they develop larger muscles by regularly lifting weights? Are some people more altruistic than others because they have something different in their brain structure, or does the regular practice of choosing to do altruistic acts cause some change in brain structure? I suppose you would have to do brain scans of people from birth onward to see if good and bad actions effect brain structure.

Offline Clark

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Why People Take Risks To Help Others: Altruism's Roots In The Brain
« Reply #2 on: November 24, 2014, 09:29:42 AM »
http://ijpr.org/post/why-people-take-risks-help-others-altruisms-roots-brain

Why People Take Risks To Help Others: Altruism's Roots In The Brain
By MICHELLE TRUDEAU

[audio link]

Transcript

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

When someone does something utterly selfless, you might think, oh, they're just a generous kind of soul. But new research suggests altruism may be hardwired in the brain. Reporter Michelle Trudeau has more.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCAST)

MICHELLE TRUDEAU, BYLINE: Altruism is when you help somebody else at a cost to yourself. So you're sacrificing for another; you're taking a risk or suffering pain.

ANGELA SIMPSON: My name is Angela Simpson. I reside in Albany, New York, and I am 46 years old.

TRUDEAU: Angela is a graphic artist. She is also an extraordinary altruist. Back in 2010, Angela donated one of her kidneys to an unknown recipient.

SIMPSON: The only thing I knew about my recipient is that she was a female and she was residing in Bakersfield, California.

TRUDEAU: The surgery to remove Angela's kidney occurred at a transplant hospital in New York City.

SIMPSON: And my kidney was shipped to California immediately after it was extracted.

TRUDEAU: Angela's altruistic act begs the question why would someone donate a perfectly healthy part of their body to a total stranger, go through the risk of major surgery and do it willingly - even happily - for no pay, no remuneration and anonymously? Here's how Angela explains her decision.

SIMPSON: At that time in my life, I was 42 years old. I was very single. I had no children; you know, very, very fortunate - loved my life. But I really felt like I would question often what is my purpose?

TRUDEAU: So when she heard about the critical need for kidney donations - over 100,000 people in the U.S. today are waiting for a kidney transplant...

SIMPSON: To really be able to help somebody unconditionally was, like, an awe moment.

TRUDEAU: So she did it, she says, simply because she could. Professor Abigail Marsh has her own story of altruism, too.

ABIGAIL MARSH: I think I was 20 years old, and I was driving home to my parent's house in Tacoma, Washington.

TRUDEAU: Long story short - a freak highway accident. Her car spins around and stalls in the fast lane. A stranger stops, dodges through traffic, helps her to safety saving her life and then disappears. A true altruist - risking his own life to help someone he didn't know and would never see again. This propelled Abigail Marsh toward her professional career, one of today's leading researchers of altruism. Now at Georgetown University, Marsh studies what she calls extraordinary altruists - most recently, a study of 19, including Angela, from around the country who donated a kidney to a stranger.

MARSH: And we brought them to Georgetown for testing.

TRUDEAU: Psych testing, brain imaging studies, extensive background profiles, etc. But, says Marsh...

MARSH: Most of the test that we did didn't show any differences between the altruistic donors and people who had not been donors.

TRUDEAU: All pretty normal - except for a telltale difference in a part of our brain called the amygdala. It's an almond-shaped cluster of nerves; it's our emotional radar. And it was significantly larger in altruists compared to those who'd never donated an organ. Additionally, Marsh reports that the amygdala in altruists is supersensitive to fear or distress in another's face.

MARSH: They showed this very specific increase in amygdala activation in response to others' fear.

TRUDEAU: Now in previous research, Marsh reports some polar opposite findings in a group of psychopaths. Using the same tests as with the altruists, Marsh found that psychopaths have smaller, less active amygdalas. The brains' emotional radar in psychopaths was blunted and relatively unresponsive to someone else's distress or fear. For NPR News, I'm Michelle Trudeau.
Unrelated directed kidney donor in 2003, recipient and I both well.
620 time blood and platelet donor since 1976 and still giving!
Elected to the OPTN/UNOS Boards of Directors & Executive, Kidney Transplantation, and Ad Hoc Public Solicitation of Organ Donors Committees, 2005-2011
Proud grandpa!

Offline Clark

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fMRI
« Reply #3 on: November 28, 2014, 09:12:20 PM »
http://xkcd.com/1453/

Our fMRI study... (be sure to mouse over the image to get the complete text.)
Unrelated directed kidney donor in 2003, recipient and I both well.
620 time blood and platelet donor since 1976 and still giving!
Elected to the OPTN/UNOS Boards of Directors & Executive, Kidney Transplantation, and Ad Hoc Public Solicitation of Organ Donors Committees, 2005-2011
Proud grandpa!

Offline Clark

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Re: Neural and cognitive characteristics of extraordinary altruists
« Reply #4 on: January 04, 2016, 06:37:36 PM »
Bumping this up as it was cited in recent news. Brains....
Unrelated directed kidney donor in 2003, recipient and I both well.
620 time blood and platelet donor since 1976 and still giving!
Elected to the OPTN/UNOS Boards of Directors & Executive, Kidney Transplantation, and Ad Hoc Public Solicitation of Organ Donors Committees, 2005-2011
Proud grandpa!

 

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