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bioRxiv · 10.1101/683730

Guilty by association: How group-based (collective) guilt arises in the brain

Li, Z.·Yu, H.·Zhou, Y.·Kalenscher, T.·Zhou, X.
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Abstract

People do not only feel guilty for transgressions of social norms/expectations that they are causally responsible for, but they also feel guilty for transgressions committed by those they identify as in-group (i.e., collective or group-based guilt). However, the neurocognitive basis of group-based guilt and its relation to personal guilt are unknown. To address these questions, we combined functional MRI with an interaction-based minimal group paradigm in which participants either directly caused harm to victims (i.e., personal guilt), or observed in-group members cause harm to the victims (i.e., group-based guilt). In three experiments (N = 90), we demonstrated that perceived shared responsibility with in-group members in the transgression predicted behavioral and neural manifestations of group-based guilt. Multivariate pattern analysis of the functional MRI data showed that group-based guilt recruited a similar brain representation in anterior middle cingulate cortex as personal guilt. These results have broaden our understanding of how group membership is integrated into social emotions.

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Li, Z., Yu, H., Zhou, Y., Kalenscher, T., Zhou, X.. 2019-06-27. Guilty by association: How group-based (collective) guilt arises in the brain. https://doi.org/10.1101/683730

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