Individual behavior during financial decision making is motivated by fairness, but an unanswered question from previous studies is whether particular patterns of brain activity correspond to different profiles of fairness. Event Related Potentials (ERPs) were recorded from 39 participants who played the role of allocators in a Dictator Game (DG) and responders in an Ultimatum Game (UG). Two very homogeneous groups were formed by fair and selfish individuals. At fronto-central cortical sites, the latency of ERP early negativity (N1) was 10 ms shorter in selfish participants than in fair participants. In fair DG players, the subsequent positive wave P2 suggested that more cognitive resources were required when they allocated the least gains to the other party. P2 latency and amplitude in the selfish group supported the hypothesis that these participants tended to maximize their profit. During UG, we observed that medial frontal negativity (MFN) occurred earlier and with greater amplitude when selfish participants rejected less favorable endowment shares. In this case, all players received zero payoffs, which showed that MFN in selfish participants was associated with a spiteful punishment. At posterior-parietal sites, we found that the greater the selfishness, the greater the amplitude of the late positive component (LPC). Our results bring new evidence to the existence of specific somatic markers associated with the activation of distinct cerebral circuits by the evaluation of fair and unfair proposals in participants characterized by different expressions of perceived fairness, thus suggesting that a particular brain dynamics could be associated with moral decisions.

In the framework of neuroeconomics, Event Related Potentials (ERPs) were recorded during a combination of a Dictator Game (DG), in which the participants always played the role of Allocators, and an Ultimatum Game (UG), in which the participants always played the role of Responders. Behavioral analysis showed that the majority of participants were characterized by very low levels of altruistic decision making, which included two homogenous groups of individuals, one expressing fairness (GrpF, about 26%) and one selfish behavior (GrpS, about 20%). In the analysis of both games, an early negativity (N1) in the fronto-central cortical sites distinguished the GrpF and GrpS participants. The subsequent P2 wave component appeared more associated with the characteristics of the stimulus than with its behavioral value. During UG, we observed that a medial frontal negativity (MFN) occurred earlier and with greater amplitude in GrpS than in GrpF, which depended to a large extent to a spiteful punishment when the Responder refused offers less favorable for himself. The late positive component (LPC) of ERP recorded in posterior-parietal cortical sites was evoked earlier and with greater amplitude during UG than in DG and, in both games, LPC was evoked earlier and with greater amplitude in GrpS than in GrpF. Our results bring new evidence to the existence of different circuits activated by the evaluation of fair and unfair proposals in participants characterized by different expressions of perceived fairness, thus suggesting that particular brain dynamics could be associated with moral decisions.