Stroke of bad luck?

ABSTRACT

We hypothesized that distinct acute right hemisphere lesions disrupt separate components of valuation and emotional response to winning and losing money and of emotional empathy in observing a partner win or lose money. We measured skin conductance response (SCR) and ratings of emotions when acute right hemisphere stroke patients or healthy controls won or lost money in roulette, or when they watched a partner win or lose. Our results showed that percentage of damage after stroke to right anterior insula and frontal operculum negatively correlated with both SCR to winning and losing and difference between rating wins versus losses.

KEYWORDS:

• Empathy
• autonomic nervous system
• emotions
• social cognition
• stroke

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke) under grants R01NS47691, R01DC05375 (to AEH) and R01NS38493 (to FAL); National Institute on Deafness and Communication Disorders under grant R01DC05375 and NICHD under grant R01 HD065955. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the views the National Institutes of Health.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke) under grants R01NS47691, R01DC05375 (to AEH) and R01NS38493 (to FAL); National Institute on Deafness and Communication Disorders under grant R01DC05375 and NICHD under grant R01 HD065955.