Processing counterfactual and hypothetical conditionals: An fMRI investigation

Abstract

Counterfactual thinking is ubiquitous in everyday life and an important aspect of cognition and emotion. Although counterfactual thought has been argued to differ from processing factual or hypothetical information, imaging data which elucidate these differences on a neural level are still scarce. We investigated the neural correlates of processing counterfactual sentences under visual and aural presentation. We compared conditionals in subjunctive mood which explicitly contradicted previously presented facts (i.e. counterfactuals) to conditionals framed in indicative mood which did not contradict factual world knowledge and thus conveyed a hypothetical supposition. Our results show activation in right occipital cortex (cuneus) and right basal ganglia (caudate nucleus) during counterfactual sentence processing. Importantly the occipital activation is not only present under visual presentation but also with purely auditory stimulus presentation, precluding a visual processing artifact. Thus our results can be interpreted as reflecting the fact that counterfactual conditionals pragmatically imply the relevance of keeping in mind both factual and supposed information whereas the hypothetical conditionals imply that real world information is irrelevant for processing the conditional and can be omitted. The need to sustain representations of factual and suppositional events during counterfactual sentence processing requires increased mental imagery and integration efforts. Our findings are compatible with predictions based on mental model theory.

Neural activity associated with self, other, and object-based counterfactual thinking

“…Interestingly, Kulakova et al (2013) found involvement of one core DN region (right cuneus) with an activation peak that was almost identical to our finding in LV1 for the person-based > object-based contrast. In their study, Kulakova and collaborators had participants semantically evaluate hypothetical and counterfactual sentences presented either visually or aurally.…”

“…Given recent neuroimaging results showing significant overlap in DN regions during episodic memory and theory of mind tasks (Spreng & Grady, 2010; Mitchell, 2009), and greater involvement of DN during simulations that involve primarily autobiographical details rather than tasks involving non-autobiographical processing of objects (Addis, Wong, & Schacter, 2007, Addis et al, 2009; Hassabis et al, 2007), we expected to see greater involvement of DN during person-based (i.e., self and other) relative to object-based counterfactual simulations. Indeed, two recent fMRI studies exploring neural correlates of semantic evaluation of non-autobiographical hypothetical and counterfactual statements show relatively little involvement of DN regions (Nieuwland, 2012; Kulakova et al, 2013), further suggesting that object-based counterfactual simulations may primarily recruit processes outside the DN.…”

The Relation Between Factual and Counterfactual Conditionals

“…Here is the resulting status of each case in the partition for a true counterfactual conditional, If Mary had had pneumonia then she would have been ill: The mental models are more parsimonious. They represent the fact, not-A and not-B, and its corresponding counterfactual possibility, A and B-as is borne out in studies of reasoning (Byrne, 2002(Byrne, , 2005(Byrne, , 2016) and a brain imaging study (Kulakova, Aichhorn, Schurz, Kronbichler, & Perner, 2013). A false counterfactual, such as:…”

Understanding Counterfactuality: A Review of Experimental Evidence for the Dual Meaning of Counterfactuals

“…The prevalent involvement of the right hemisphere was further supported by an fMRI study by Kulakova et al (2013). Factual sentences (The motor is switched off today) were followed by either a counterfactual conditional that explicitly contradicted the presented facts (If the motor had been switched on today, would it have burned fuel?)…”