Empathy is defined as the capacity to resonate with others' emotions and can be subdivided into affective and cognitive components. Few studies have focused on the role of perspective-taking within this ability. Utilizing the novel Bochumer Affective and Cognitive Empathy Task (BACET), the present study aims to determine the characteristics of specific empathy components, as well as the impact of offender vs. victim perspective-taking. A total of 21 male participants (mean age = 30.6) underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) while watching 60 videos showing two protagonists in neutral (n = 30) or violent interactions (n = 30) thereby adopting the perspective of the (later) offender or victim. Our data show that videos showing emotional (violent) content, compared to those with neutral content, were rated more emotionally negative and induced higher affective empathic involvement, particularly when adopting the victim's perspective compared to the offender's point of view. The correct assignment of people's appropriate emotion (cognitive empathy) was found to be more accurate and faster in the emotional condition relative to the neutral one. However, no significant differences in cognitive empathy performance were observed when comparing victim vs offender conditions. On a neural level, affective empathy processing, during emotional compared to neutral videos, was related to brain areas generally involved in social information processing, particularly in occipital, parietal, insular, and frontal regions. Cognitive aspects of empathy, relative to factual reasoning questions, were located in inferior occipital areas, fusiform gyrus, temporal pole, and frontal cortex. Neural differences were found depending on the perspective, i.e., empathizing with the victim, compared to the offender, during affective empathy activated parts of the right temporal lobe, whereas empathy towards the role of the offender revealed stronger activation in the right lingual gyrus. During cognitive empathy, empathy toward the victim, relative to the offender, enhanced activity of the right supramarginal and left precentral gyri. The opposite contrast did not show any significant differences. We conclude that the BACET can be a useful tool for further studying behavioral and neurobiological underpinnings of affective and cognitive empathy, especially in forensic populations since response patterns point to a significant impact of the observer's perspective.

同理心被定义为与他人情感产生共鸣的能力，可以细分为情感和认知部分。很少有研究关注换位思考在这种能力中的作用。本研究利用新颖的波鸿情感和认知同理心任务（BACET），旨在确定特定同理心成分的特征，以及犯罪者与受害者观点采择的影响。共有 21 名男性参与者（平均年龄 = 30.6 岁）在观看 60 个显示两个主角处于中立（n = 30）或暴力互动（n = 30）的视频时接受了功能磁共振成像（fMRI），从而采用了（后来的观点） ) 犯罪者或受害者。我们的数据显示，与中性内容相比，显示情感（暴力）内容的视频在情感上被评为更负面，并引发更高的情感移情参与，特别是当与犯罪者的观点相比，采用受害者的观点时。人们发现，在情绪状态下，相对于中性状态，正确分配人们的适当情绪（认知共情）会更准确、更快。然而，在比较受害者与犯罪者的情况时，没有观察到认知同理心表现存在显着差异。在神经层面上，与中性视频相比，情绪视频中的情感移情处理与通常参与社会信息处理的大脑区域有关，特别是枕叶、顶叶、岛叶和额叶区域。与事实推理问题相关的同理心认知方面位于枕下区、梭状回、颞极和额叶皮层。根据不同的视角，即与犯罪者相比，对受害者的共情发现了神经差异，在情感共情激活了右颞叶的部分过程中，而对犯罪者角色的共情则显示出右舌回的激活更强。在认知共情过程中，相对于犯罪者，对受害者的共情增强了右侧边缘上回和左侧中央前回的活动。相反的对比没有显示出任何显着差异。我们的结论是，BACET 可以成为进一步研究情感和认知同理心的行为和神经生物学基础的有用工具，特别是在法医群体中，因为反应模式表明观察者视角的重大影响。