Empathy

Narcissism and the Salience Network: Why the Brain’s Switching Mechanism Locks on Self The narcissistic brain does not choose selfishness. It defaults to it. The salience network — a circuit anchored by the right anterior insula — functions as the brain’s switching mechanism between self-focused processing and other-focused attention. In narcissistic personality patterns, this switch fails. The default mode network stays active when it should disengage, locking the brain in self-referential processing even during moments that demand empathy. What looks like a character flaw is a measurable circuit dysfunction — and Schimmelpfennig et al. (2023) mapped exactly where the failure occurs. ...