@article{ref1,
title="Doing the right thing: a common neural circuit for appropriate violent or compassionate behavior",
journal="NeuroImage",
year="2006",
author="King, John A. and Blair, R. James R. and Mitchell, Derek G. V. and Dolan, Raymond J. and Burgess, Neil",
volume="30",
number="3",
pages="1069-1076",
abstract="Humans have a considerable facility to adapt their behavior in a manner that is appropriate to social or societal context. A failure of this ability can lead to social exclusion and is a feature of disorders such as psychopathy and disruptive behavior disorder. We investigated the neural basis of this ability using a customized video game played by 12 healthy participants in an fMRI scanner. Two conditions involved extreme examples of context-appropriate action: shooting an aggressive humanoid assailant or healing a passive wounded person. Two control conditions involved carefully matched stimuli paired with inappropriate actions: shooting the person or healing the assailant. Surprisingly, the same circuit, including the amygdala and ventromedial prefrontal cortex, was activated when participants acted in a context-appropriate manner, whether being compassionate towards an injured conspecific or aggressive towards a violent assailant. The findings indicate a common system that guides behavioral expression appropriate to social or societal context irrespective of its aggressive or compassionate nature.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="1053-8119",
doi="10.1016/j.neuroimage.2005.10.011",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2005.10.011"
}