Clinical and Cortical Insights into Empathy

Clinical and cortical insights into empathy – understanding others’ mental states (cognitive empathy) and responding to them with an appropriate emotion (affective empathy) – are fragmented. In an attempt to integrate them, Marcin will present three studies, including ongoing work. In Study 1, he will discuss the effects of autism and three other psychiatric conditions on empathy, and sex-by-diagnosis interactions. In Study 2, he will discuss the effects of autism, sex, and age on empathy, cortical thickness (CT), and surface area (SA) in a framework guided by the brain’s meta-analytic activation and resting-state connectivity. In Study 3, he will discuss the effects of psychopathy on empathy, CT, and SA in the incarcerated male population. Marcin is a Research Associate at the Autism Research Centre, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom. He holds degrees in psychology (BA), neuropsychology (MSc), and neuroscience (PhD). He is passionate about cognitive and psychiatric neuroimaging using structural and functional MRI.