Figure 3.

Main brain areas involved in prosocial decisions and actions in humans and rodents. (A) Prosocial decision making in humans has been shown to recruit brain areas involved in attribution of others’ emotional and mental states, evaluation of subjective values, norm representation and compliance, and reward processing. ACC, anterior cingulate cortex. MCC, midcingulate cortex. PCC, posterior cingulate cortex. AI, anterior insula. vmPFC, ventromedial prefrontal cortex. dmPFC, dorsomedial prefrontal cortex. dlPFC, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, IPL, inferior parietal lobule. TPJ, temporoparietal junction. pSTS, posterior superior temporal sulcus. VTA, ventral tegmental area. (B) Brain areas shown to regulate prosocial behaviors in rodents. MeA, medial amygdala. MPOA, medial preoptic area. PVT, paraventricular nucleus of the thalamus. DRN, dorsal raphe nucleus. (C) Regulation of comforting behavior by the MeA-MPOA circuit in mice. In mice, olfactory cues play an important role in communicating emotional distress. Conspecific stress leads to activation of MeA neurons and MeA tachykinin (Tac1)-expressing GABAergic neurons (Tac1⁺/Vgat⁺ neurons), which promotes allogrooming behavior towards distressed partners through their projections to the MPOA, leading to a reduction of stress in the target [15].