Abstract
Self-reported empathy differs with gender and sexual orientation. The current study investigated whether mu-suppression, reflecting brain activity especially related to state empathy, also is modulated by gender and sexual orientation. Pictures of painful and non-painful actions were presented to 20 lesbians, 20 gay men, 20 heterosexual men and 20 heterosexual women, while EEG was recorded. Individual peak frequencies of mu-activity (electrodes C3, C4) were detected within the 6–11 Hz band for each participant, and mu-suppression indices were calculated. Further, verbal indicators of state empathy (pain ratings) and compassion were assessed. Only heterosexual individuals showed the typical pattern of enhanced mu-suppression in response to painful relative to non-painful pictures. Lesbian women and gay men did not show a differential mu-response. Moreover, they felt less compassion compared to heterosexual individuals. In line with this finding, the more compassion the participants reported, the stronger the mu-suppression in response to painful relative to non-painful pictures was. Pain ratings did not vary with sexual orientation. The lesser compassion reported by lesbian women and gay men is discussed as a mediator of their non-differential mu-suppression response. It is hypothesized that this pattern might relate to gay men and lesbian women tending to perceive the anonymous depicted actors as outgroup members, hence showing less compassion and reduced mu-suppression. As empathy is often related to negative feelings (empathic stress), a clear distinction between individuals to empathize with versus individuals not to emphasize with may well be an adaptive feature in same-sex oriented individuals.
Highlights
Empathy can be defined as “emotional and mental sensitivity to another’s state, from being affected by and sharing in this state to assessing the reasons for it and adopting another’s point of view”
The results showed that lesbian women and gay men differ from heterosexual individuals in several aspects of empathy; the direction of these differences seems to vary with the specific empathic marker in question
In contrast to heterosexual individuals, lesbian women and gay men do not show pronounced mu-suppression during the observation of others in pain, which is considered a neurophysiological correlate of state empathy
Summary
Empathy can be defined as “emotional and mental sensitivity to another’s state, from being affected by and sharing in this state to assessing the reasons for it and adopting another’s point of view” (de Waal & Preston, 2017, p. 498). The only brain imaging study focusing sexual orientation-related differences in central nervous activation during an empathizing task reported that heterosexual women and gay men compared to lesbians and heterosexual men showed more activation in brain areas involved in inferring the mental states of others (Perry, Walder, Hendler, & Shamay-Tsoory, 2013). Given that several lines of research propose differences between gay and heterosexual men in empathic skills, and that reports on differences between lesbian and heterosexual women in empathic skills are less consistent (and less well studied), the current study aimed at systematically investigating sexual orientation (same-sex oriented vs heterosexual) related differences in state empathy in both men and women (in line with this notion, analyses focusing androphilic vs gynephilic individuals were not of interest in the present study). All participants gave written informed consent and were compensated with course credit or a fixed sum of 17.50 euros
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