Prior work shows that compared to European Americans, East Asians show an enhanced propensity to take the perspective of another person. In the current work, we tested whether this cultural difference might be reflected in the gray matter (GM) volume of the temporoparietal junction (TPJ), a brain region selectively implicated in perspective taking and mentalizing. We also explored whether the cultural difference in the TPJ GM volume might be moderated by dopamine D4 receptor gene (DRD4) exon 3 variable-number tandem repeat polymorphism. Structural magnetic resonance imaging of 66 European Americans and 66 East Asian-born Asians were subjected to voxel-based morphometry. It was observed that the GM volume of the right TPJ was greater among East Asians than among European Americans. Moreover, this cultural difference was significantly more pronounced among carriers of the 7- or 2-repeat allele of DRD4 than among the non-carriers of these alleles. Our findings contribute to the growing evidence that culture can shape the brain.

中文翻译：

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颞顶关节的灰质体积随文化而变化：多巴胺D4受体基因（DRD4）的调节作用。

先前的研究表明，与欧洲裔美国人相比，东亚人显示出更倾向于接受另一个人的视角。在当前的工作中，我们测试了这种文化差异是否可能反映在颞顶接合部（TPJ）的灰质（GM）体积中，该区域是选择性地参与观点获取和思维化的大脑区域。我们还探讨了多巴胺D4受体基因（DRD4）外显子3可变数目串联重复序列多态性是否可以缓解TPJ GM量的文化差异。对66名欧洲裔美国人和66名东亚裔亚洲人的结构磁共振成像进行了基于体素的形态测量。据观察，在东亚人中，正确的TPJ的转基因量要大于欧洲人。此外，在DRD4的7个或2个重复等位基因的携带者中，这种文化差异比在这些等位基因的非携带者中更为明显。我们的发现为越来越多的证据表明文化可以塑造大脑。