1,940
Views
152
CrossRef citations to date
0
Altmetric
Original Articles

The self as a moral agent: Linking the neural bases of social agency and moral sensitivity

, , , , , , & show all
Pages 336-352 | Published online: 17 Jul 2007

References

  • Allport , G. W. 1954 . The nature of prejudice , Boston : Beacon Press .
  • Aron , A. , Fisher , H. , Mashek , D. J. , Strong , G. , Li , H. and Brown , L. L. 2005 . Reward, motivation, and emotion systems associated with early stage, intense, romantic love . Journal of Neurophysiology , 94 : 327 – 337 .
  • Bandura , A. 2006 . Toward a psychology of human agency . Perspectives on Psychological Science , 1 : 164 – 180 .
  • Bartels , A. and Zeki , S. 2004 . The neural correlates of maternal and romantic love . NeuroImage , 21 : 1155 – 1166 .
  • Batson , C. D. , Batson , J. G. , Slingsby , J. K. , Harrell , K. L. , Peekna , H. M. and Todd , R. M. 1991 . Empathic joy and the empathy–altruism hypothesis . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , 61 : 413 – 426 .
  • Beer , J. S. , Heerey , E. A. , Keltner , D. , Scabini , D. and Knight , R. T. 2003 . The regulatory function of self-conscious emotion: Insights from patients with orbitofrontal damage . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , 85 : 594 – 604 .
  • Bellgowan , P. S. , Bandettini , P. A. , van Gelderen , P. , Martin , A. and Bodurka , J. 2006 . Improved BOLD detection in the medial temporal region using parallel imaging and voxel volume reduction . NeuroImage , 29 : 1244 – 1251 .
  • Berthoz , S. , Armony , J. L. , Blair , R. J. and Dolan , R. J. 2002 . An fMRI study of intentional and unintentional (embarrassing) violations of social norms . Brain , 125 : 1696 – 1708 .
  • Blair , R. J. , Morris , J. S. , Frith , C. D. , Perrett , D. I. and Dolan , R. J. 1999 . Dissociable neural responses to facial expressions of sadness and anger . Brain , 122 ( 5 ) : 883 – 893 .
  • Blakemore , S. J. and Frith , U. 2004 . How does the brain deal with the social world? . Neuroreport , 15 : 119 – 128 .
  • Blakemore , S. J. , Winston , J. and Frith , U. 2004 . Social cognitive neuroscience: Where are we heading? . Trends in Cognitive Sciences , 8 : 216 – 222 .
  • Botvinick , M. , Nystrom , L. E. , Fissell , K. , Carter , C. S. and Cohen , J. D. 1999 . Conflict monitoring versus selection-for-action in anterior cingulate cortex . Nature , 402 : 179 – 181 .
  • Chorvat , T. and McCabe , K. 2004 . The brain and the law . Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences , 359 : 1727 – 1736 .
  • Christoff , K. and Gabrieli , J. D. E. 2000 . The frontopolar cortex and human cognition: Evidence for a rostrocaudal hierarchical organization within the human prefrontal cortex . Psychobiology , 28 : 168 – 186 .
  • Decety , J. and Jackson , P. L. 2004 . The functional architecture of human empathy . Behavioral and Cognitive Neuroscience Reviews , 3 : 71 – 100 .
  • Decety , J. and Sommerville , J. A. 2003 . Shared representations between self and other: A social cognitive neuroscience view . Trends in Cognitive Sciences , 7 : 527 – 533 .
  • Deichmann , R. , Gottfried , J. A. , Hutton , C. and Turner , R. 2003 . Optimized EPI for fMRI studies of the orbitofrontal cortex . NeuroImage , 19 : 430 – 441 .
  • den Ouden , H. E. , Frith , U. , Frith , C. and Blakemore , S. J. 2005 . Thinking about intentions . NeuroImage , 28 : 787 – 796 .
  • Drevets , W. C. , Ongur , D. and Price , J. L. 1998 . Neuroimaging abnormalities in the subgenual prefrontal cortex: implications for the pathophysiology of familial mood disorders . Molecular Psychiatry , 3 : 220 – 226 .
  • Eisenberg , N. 2000 . Emotion regulation and moral development . Annual Review of Psychology , 51 : 665 – 697 .
  • Eisenberger , N. I. , Lieberman , M. D. and Williams , K. D. 2003 . Does rejection hurt? An fMRI study of social exclusion . Science , 302 : 290 – 292 .
  • Eslinger , P. J. , Flaherty-Craig , C. V. and Benton , A. L. 2004 . Developmental outcomes after early prefrontal cortex damage . Brain and Cognition , 55 : 84 – 103 .
  • Fessler , D. 1999 . “ Toward an understanding of the universality of second order emotions ” . In Beyond nature or nurture: Biocultural approaches to the emotions , Edited by: Hinton , A. 75 – 116 . New York : Cambridge University Press .
  • Freedman , L. J. , Insel , T. R. and Smith , Y. 2000 . Subcortical projections of area 25 (subgenual cortex) of the macaque monkey . Journal of Comparative Neurology , 421 : 172 – 188 .
  • Frith , C. and Frith , U. 2005 . Theory of mind . Current Biology , 15 : R644 – R646 .
  • Frith , U. and Frith , C. D. 2003 . Development and neurophysiology of mentalizing . Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences , 358 : 459 – 473 .
  • Gallese , V. , Keysers , C. , & Rizzolatti , G. ( 2004 ). A unifying view of the basis of social cognition . Trends in Cognitive Sciences , 8 , 396 – 403 .
  • Goodenough , O. R. and Prehn , K. 2004 . A neuroscientific approach to normative judgment in law and justice . Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences , 359 : 1709 – 1726 .
  • Gosselin , N. , Samson , S. , Adolphs , R. , Noulhiane , M. , Roy , M. Hasboun , D. 2006 . Emotional responses to unpleasant music correlates with damage to the parahippocampal cortex . Brain , 129 : 2585 – 2592 .
  • Gusnard , D. A. , Akbudak , E. , Shulman , G. L. and Raichle , M. E. 2001 . Medial prefrontal cortex and self-referential mental activity: relation to a default mode of brain function . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA , 98 : 4259 – 4264 .
  • Gusnard , D. A. and Raichle , M. E. 2001 . Searching for a baseline: functional imaging and the resting human brain . Nature Reviews. Neuroscience , 2 : 685 – 694 .
  • Haidt , J. 2001 . The emotional dog and its rational tail: a social intuitionist approach to moral judgment . Psychological Review , 108 : 814 – 834 .
  • Haidt , J. 2003 . “ The moral emotions ” . In Handbook of affective sciences , Edited by: Davidson , R. J. , Scherer , K. R. and Goldsmith , H. H. 852 – 870 . Oxford, , UK : Oxford University Press .
  • Happé , F. 2003 . Theory of mind and the self . Annals of the New York Academy of Science , 1001 : 134 – 144 .
  • Harris , N. 2003 . Reassessing the dimensionality of the moral emotions . British Journal of Psychology , 94 : 457 – 473 .
  • Heekeren , H. R. , Wartenburger , I. , Schmidt , H. , Prehn , K. , Schwintowski , H. P. and Villringer , A. 2005 . Influence of bodily harm on neural correlates of semantic and moral decision-making . NeuroImage , 24 : 887 – 897 .
  • Iacoboni , M. 2005 . Neural mechanisms of imitation . Current Opinion in Neurobiology , 15 : 632 – 637 .
  • Insel , T. R. and Young , L. J. 2001 . The neurobiology of attachment . Nature Reviews. Neuroscience , 2 : 129 – 136 .
  • Kringelbach , M. L. 2005 . The human orbitofrontal cortex: linking reward to hedonic experience . Nat Rev Neurosci , 6 : 691 – 702 .
  • Kringelbach , M. L. and Rolls , E. T. 2004 . The functional neuroanatomy of the human orbitofrontal cortex: evidence from neuroimaging and neuropsychology . Progress in Neurobiology , 72 : 341 – 372 .
  • Liotti , M. , Mayberg , H. S. , Brannan , S. K. , McGinnis , S. , Jerabek , P. and Fox , P. T. 2000 . Differential limbic–cortical correlates of sadness and anxiety in healthy subjects: implications for affective disorders . Biological Psychiatry , 48 : 30 – 42 .
  • Martin , A. and Weisberg , J. 2003 . Neural foundations for understanding social and mechanical concepts . Cognitive Neuropsychology , 20 : 575 – 587 .
  • Mayberg , H. S. , Liotti , M. , Brannan , S. K. , McGinnis , S. , Mahurin , R. K. Jerabek , P. A. 1999 . Reciprocal limbic–cortical function and negative mood: converging PET findings in depression and normal sadness . American Journal of Psychiatry , 156 : 675 – 682 .
  • Moll , J. , de Oliveira-Souza , R. , Bramati , I. E. and Grafman , J. 2002a . Functional networks in emotional moral and nonmoral social judgments . NeuroImage , 16 : 696 – 703 .
  • Moll , J. , de Oliveira-Souza , R. and Eslinger , P. J. 2003 . Morals and the human brain: a working model . Neuroreport , 14 : 299 – 305 .
  • Moll , J. , de Oliveira-Souza , R. , Eslinger , P. J. , Bramati , I. E. , Mourao-Miranda , J. Andreivolo , P. A. 2002b . The neural correlates of moral sensitivity: a functional magnetic resonance imaging investigation of basic and moral emotions . Journal of Neuroscience , 22 : 2730 – 2736 .
  • Moll , J. , de Oliveira-Souza , R. , Moll , F. T. , Ignacio , F. A. , Bramati , I. E. Caparelli-Daquer . 2005a . The moral affiliations of disgust: A functional MRI study . Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology , 18 : 68 – 78 .
  • Moll , J. , de Oliveira-Souza , R. , Zahn , R. , & Grafman , J. (in press) . The cognitive neuroscience of moral emotions . In W. Sinnott-Armstrong Moral psychology. Vol. 3: Morals and the brain . Cambridge, MA : MIT Press .
  • Moll , J. , Eslinger , P. J. and de Oliveira-Souza , R. 2001 . Frontopolar and anterior temporal cortex activation in a moral judgment task: preliminary functional MRI results in normal subjects . Arquivos de Neuro-psiquiatria , 59 : 657 – 664 .
  • Moll , J. , Krueger , F. , Zahn , R. , Pardini , M , de Oliveira-Souza , R. and Grafman , J. 2006 . Human fronto-mesolimbic networks guide decisions about charitable donation . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America , 103 : 15623 – 15628 .
  • Moll , J. , Zahn , R. , de Oliveira-Souza , R. , Krueger , F. and Grafman , J. 2005b . Opinion: the neural basis of human moral cognition . Nature Reviews. Neuroscience , 6 : 799 – 809 .
  • Nauta , W. J. 1960 . Limbic system and hypothalamus: anatomical aspects . Physiol Rev Suppl , 4 : 102 – 104 .
  • Northoff , G. and Bermpohl , F. 2004 . Cortical midline structures and the self . Trends in Cognitive Science , 8 : 102 – 107 .
  • O'Doherty , J. , Kringelbach , M. L. , Rolls , E. T. , Hornak , J. and Andrews , C. 2001 . Abstract reward and punishment representations in the human orbitofrontal cortex . Nature Neuroscience , 4 : 95 – 102 .
  • Öngür , D. , Ferry , A. T. and Price , J. L. 2003 . Architectonic subdivision of the human orbital and medial prefrontal cortex . The Journal of Comparative Neurology , 460 : 425 – 449 .
  • Pietrini , P. , Guazzelli , M. , Basso , G. , Jaffe , K. and Grafman , J. 2000 . Neural correlates of imaginal aggressive behavior assessed by positron emission tomography in healthy subjects . American Journal of Psychiatry , 157 : 1772 – 1781 .
  • Raichle , M. E. and Gusnard , D. A. 2005 . Intrinsic brain activity sets the stage for expression of motivated behavior . Journal of Comparative Neurology , 493 : 167 – 176 .
  • Ramnani , N. and Owen , A. M. 2004 . Anterior prefrontal cortex: insights into function from anatomy and neuroimaging . Nature Reviews. Neuroscience , 5 : 184 – 194 .
  • Rolls , E. T. , Hornak , J. , Wade , D. and McGrath , J. 1994 . Emotion-related learning in patients with social and emotional changes associated with frontal lobe damage . Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry , 57 : 1518 – 1524 .
  • Rozin , P. , Lowery , L. , Imada , S. and Haidt , J. 1999 . The CAD triad hypothesis: a mapping between three moral emotions (contempt, anger, disgust) and three moral codes (community, autonomy, divinity) . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , 76 : 574 – 586 .
  • Ruby , P. and Decety , J. 2001 . Effect of subjective perspective taking during simulation of action: a PET investigation of agency . Nature Neuroscience , 4 : 546 – 550 .
  • Ruby , P. and Decety , J. 2004 . How would you feel versus how do you think she would feel? A neuroimaging study of perspective-taking with social emotions . Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience , 16 : 988 – 999 .
  • Schulkin , J. ( 2000 ). Roots of social sensitivity and neural function . Cambridge, MA : MIT Press .
  • Schulkin , J. 2004 . Bodily sensibility: Intelligent action , New York : Oxford University Press .
  • Schultz , W. 2000 . Multiple reward signals in the brain . Nature Reviews. Neuroscience , 1 : 199 – 207 .
  • Schultz , W. , Dayan , P. and Montague , P. R. 1997 . A neural substrate of prediction and reward . Science , 275 : 1593 – 1599 .
  • Shin , L. M. , Dougherty , D. D. , Orr , S. P. , Pitman , R. K. , Lasko , M. Macklin , M. L. 2000 . Activation of anterior paralimbic structures during guilt-related script-driven imagery . Biological Psychiatry , 48 : 43 – 50 .
  • Singer , T. ( 2004 ). Empathy for pain involves the affective but not sensory components of pain . Science , 303 , 1157 – 1162 .
  • Singer , W. 2001 . Consciousness and the binding problem . Annals of the New York Academy of Science , 929 : 123 – 146 .
  • Takahashi , H. , Yahata , N. , Koeda , M. , Matsuda , T. , Asai , K. and Okubo , Y. 2004 . Brain activation associated with evaluative processes of guilt and embarrassment: An fMRI study . NeuroImage , 23 : 967 – 974 .
  • Tangney , J. P. 2002 . “ Self-conscious emotions: The self as a moral guide ” . In Self and motivation: Emerging psychological perspectives , Edited by: Tesser , A. , Stapel , D. A. and Woods , J. V. 97 – 117 . Washington, DC : American Psychological Association .
  • Tremblay , L. and Schultz , W. 1999 . Relative reward preference in primate orbitofrontal cortex . Nature , 398 : 704 – 708 .
  • Vogt , B. A. 2005 . Pain and emotion interactions in subregions of the cingulate gyrus . Nature Reviews. Neuroscience , 6 : 533 – 544 .
  • Wood , J. N. and Grafman , J. 2003 . Human prefrontal cortex: processing and representational perspectives . Nature Reviews. Neuroscience , 4 : 139 – 147 .
  • Worsley , K. J. , Marrett , S. , Neelin , P. , Vandal , A. C. , Friston , K. J. and Evans , A. C. 1996 . A unified statistical approach for determining significant signals in images of cerebral activation . Human Brain Mapping , 4 : 58 – 73 .
  • Young , L. J. and Wang , Z. 2004 . The neurobiology of pair bonding . Nature Neuroscience , 7 : 1048 – 1054 .
  • Zeki , S. and Goodenough , O. 2004 . Law and the brain: introduction . Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences , 359 : 1661 – 1665 .

Reprints and Corporate Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

To request a reprint or corporate permissions for this article, please click on the relevant link below:

Academic Permissions

Please note: Selecting permissions does not provide access to the full text of the article, please see our help page How do I view content?

Obtain permissions instantly via Rightslink by clicking on the button below:

If you are unable to obtain permissions via Rightslink, please complete and submit this Permissions form. For more information, please visit our Permissions help page.