Right Temporoparietal Junction Underlies Avoidance of Moral Transgression in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Autor(es)

Hu, Yang ^{[1, 2]} ; Pereira, Alessandra M. ^[3] ; Gao, Xiaoxue ^[4] ; Campos, Brunno M. ^[3] ; Derrington, Edmund ^{[2, 5]} ; Corgnet, Brice ^[6] ; Zhou, Xiaolin ^{[7, 1, 4]} ; Cendes, Fernando ^[3] ; Dreher, Jean-Claude ^{[2, 5]}

Afiliação do(s) autor(es)

^[1] Shanghai Int Studies Univ, Sch Business & Management, Key Lab Appl Brain & Cognit Sci, Shanghai 201620 - Peoples R China

^[2] CNRS, Inst Sci Cognit Marc Jeannerod, Neuroecon Lab, F-69675 Bron - France

^[3] Univ Campinas UNICAMP, Brazilian Inst Neurosci & Neurotechnol, Sch Med Sci, Neuroimaging Lab, BR-13083970 Campinas - Brazil

^[4] Peking Univ, Sch Psychol & Cognit Sci, Beijing 100871 - Peoples R China

^[5] Univ Claude Bernard Lyon 1, F-69100 Villeurbanne - France

^[6] EmLyon, F-69130 Ecully - France

^[7] Peking Univ, PKU IDG McGovern Inst Brain Res, Beijing 100871 - Peoples R China

• Tipo de documento: Artigo Científico
• Fonte: JOURNAL OF NEUROSCIENCE; v. 41, n. 8, p. 1699-1715, FEB 24 2021.
• Citações Web of Science: 0

Resumo

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterized by a core difference in theory-of-mind (ToM) ability, which extends to alterations in moral judgment and decision-making. Although the function of the right temporoparietal junction (rTPJ), a key neural marker of ToM and morality, is known to be atypical in autistic individuals, the neurocomputational mechanisms underlying its specific changes in moral decision-making remain unclear. Here, we addressed this question by using a novel fMRI task together with computational modeling and representational similarity analysis (RSA). ASD participants and healthy control subjects (HCs) decided in public or private whether to incur a personal cost for funding a morally good cause (Good Context) or receive a personal gain for benefiting a morally bad cause (Bad Context). Compared with HC, individuals with ASD were much more likely to reject the opportunity to earn ill gotten money by supporting a bad cause than were HCs. Computational modeling revealed that this resulted from heavily weighing benefits for themselves and the bad cause, suggesting that ASD participants apply a rule of refusing to serve a bad cause because they evaluate the negative consequences of their actions more severely. Moreover, RSA revealed a reduced rTPJ representation of the information specific to moral contexts in ASD participants. Together, these findings indicate the contribution of rTPJ in representing information concerning moral rules and provide new insights for the neurobiological basis underpinning moral behaviors illustrated by a specific difference of rTPJ in ASD participants. (AU)

• Processo FAPESP: 13/07559-3 - Instituto Brasileiro de Neurociência e Neurotecnologia - BRAINN
• Beneficiário: Fernando Cendes
• Modalidade de apoio: Auxílio à Pesquisa - Centros de Pesquisa, Inovação e Difusão - CEPIDs