Dr. Peggy Mason is a Professor in the Department of Neurobiology at the University of Chicago. She received both her BA in Biology and her Phd in Neuroscience from Harvard. Professor Mason has been on the faculty of University of Chicago since 1992. She has taught undergraduate, graduate and medical students and has received numerous teaching awards. Using her nearly 15 years of experience teaching medical students, Professor Mason wrote a single-author textbook designed for medical students (Medical Neurobiology, Oxford University Press, 2017). Professor Mason's research focuses on the neurobiological basis of empathy and helping.

In this episode, we talk about empathy and helping behavior in humans and other animal models, namely rats. We discuss first how empathy might have evolved, and the neurobiological bases of it, including the roles played by the amygdala, the hypothalamus, the prefrontal cortex and the temporo-parietal junction. We also talk about the flaws with the research surrounding mirror neurons. Then, we talk about the situations that invoke empathy. We also refer to Paul Bloom’s book, Against Empathy, and the difference between emotional empathy and cognitive empathy, and between empathy and compassion. We also briefly refer to how empathy might work in psychopaths. Finally, we talk about oxytocin and other hormones and neurotransmitters that participate in mediating empathic behavior, and the differences between pro-social behavior in humans and other animals.

Time Links:

00:52 How empathy evolved

04:55 How the brain processes empathy (amygdala, hypothalamus, prefrontal cortex)

08:57 The trouble with mirror neurons

11:44 The temporo-parietal junction

14:59 The types of behavior that invoke empathy

17:58 It also depends on the context and on the individual in question

25:25 Paul Bloom, Against Empathy, and emotional and cognitive empathy

29:55 Emotions as cognitive tools

33:32 Psychopathic behavior

38:24 What happens when individuals get distressed

41:48 Oxytocin, hormones, and neurotransmitters associated with empathy

47:04 Pro-social behavior in humans and other nonprimate mammals

50:50 People’s reports of their behavior and what they feel are very unreliable