Abstract Intentional emotional contagion, the conscious transmission of emotions between individuals, has unclear neurobehavioral mechanisms in naturalistic dyadic communications. Experiment 1 demonstrated that conscious engagement enhanced sad emotional contagion between strangers. Using the fNIRS pseudo-hyperscanning technique, Experiment 2 showed a behavioral-neural dissociation in intentional sadness contagion: Behavioral findings revealed increased interpersonal intimacy and listener altruism. Neurocognitive findings demonstrated reduced activation in the left frontopolar cortex, bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC), and angular/supramarginal gyri. While weaker interpersonal neural synchronization emerged between the speaker’s left frontopolar/dlPFC and listener’s right dlPFC. Mediation analysis indicated that intentional emotional contagion mediated emotional communication and self-other overlap, extending Emotions as Social Information Model. Findings suggest that intentional sadness contagion based on dyadic story sharing has an adaptive neurocognitive reorganization which facilitates prosocial behavior.
Wei et al. (2026) studied this question.