Neural correlates of race-related social evaluations for African Americans and White Americans.

Abstract

To examine differences in patterns of brain activation associated with a race-related social evaluative task for a sample of African American and White American adults. Participants were exposed to images of White American and African American targets embedded in various contexts across three emotional valences: angry/hostile, happy/joyful, and neutral/ambiguous. Functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to measure brain activity. Between-group comparisons revealed that African Americans, as compared to White Americans, exhibited activation in the inferior frontal gyrus and parahippocampal gyrus to images of happy (vs. neutral) same-race targets. White Americans, compared, to African Americans displayed activation in the inferior frontal gyrus and anterior cingulate cortex to images of happy (vs. neutral) same-race targets. Activation in limbic areas was observed for African Americans to neutral (vs. happy) images of White American targets, while no significant pattern of activation was found for White Americans to images of neutral/ambiguous African American targets. A significant correlation was found between scores for previous exposure to race-related incidents and amygdala activation for African Americans to White American targets. White Americans generally exhibited more activation in regions associated with conflict resolution and cognitive control, while African Americans exhibited activation mostly in areas associated with emotion and memory. Our findings further imply that previous exposure to race-related incidents for African Americans may alter neural responses to White American targets in imaging studies. Implications of the findings are discussed.