A Transcultural Study : The Neural Mechanisms Of Theory Of Mind And Self-withother Representation Among Chinese And Japanese

Culture is the sum of a group’s behavioral norms and the differences between its members and other groups.Individual’s mental progress has an effect on their cultural environment,which in turn determines their psychological processes.The theory of mind is the capacity to attribute mental states of others,such as wills,desires and beliefs.During social interaction,representation of information about self and others also occurs.A large body of research evidence implies that culture has an influence on cognitive activity associated with theory of mind and self-with-other representation,however,these studies focus on quite different cultural situations in East Asia and West.This study takes Chinese and Japanese cultures as representative objects within East Asia（Chinese = 12,Japanese = 12）,and attempts to explore whether minor cultural environment differences have an effect on the behavior and neural activity of social thinking perception such as theory of mind and self-other processing.This thesis highlights cross-cultural neuroscience and psychology studies on self-other representation and theory of mind.In Addition,this thesis discusses briefly how to process functional magnetic resonance imaging（f MRI）date for natural stimuli.In experiment I,the Frith‐Happé animations task was used to investigate the differences in theory of mind ability and neural mechanisms between Chinese and Japanese,with the goal of assessing the difference in theory of mind ability and comparing the differences in neural representational patterns of the encoding theory of mind.The experiment discovered that both groups of Chinese and Japanese individuals had a significantly activation of the medial prefrontal cortex.The encoding of theory of mind in the right middle temporal gyrus,right superior temporal gyrus,and right caudate nucleus of Chinese subjects was stronger than that of Japanese participants,whereas the left precentral gyrus and superior frontal gyrus encode theory of mind more strongly than in Chinese subjects.The findings imply that minor cultural differences may also have an effect on the neural mechanism.In a cross-cultural situation,there were no significant differences in theory of mind capacity between China and Japan.The neural mechanisms underlying theory of mind differ between China and Japan due to the cross-cultural environment.In comparison to the Japanese,the Chinese may be more prone to utilizing empathy to speculate about others’ mental states.In contrast to the Chinese,the Japanese may be more likely to use movement imaging to figure out what other people are thinking.In experiment II,a trait evaluation task and f MRI technology were used to investigate the Chinese-Japanese cross-cultural neurological process of self-other representation.This research reveals no differences in the cross-cultural neural activity of self-other representation between Chinese and Japanese,implying that minor cultural differences may have little effect on self-other representation and that Chinese and Japanese cultures may share self-other representation structures.In conclusion,this study provides neuroscience evidence for the consequences of minor cultural environment differences on theory of mind and self-other processing,as well as a neuroscience and psychology research perspective for other disciplines researching East Asian culture.