Abstract

Back ground and purpose: Right tempro- parietal junction (rTPJ), as a supramodal associative area of the brain, plays an important role in visuao spatial functions and social cognition. The current study aims to evaluate the role of rTPJ in mental rotation, perspective taking and mind reading.
Method: Thirty healthy male subjects received both anodal and cathodal transcranial direct current stimulation of 2 mA intensity over the rTPJ for 20 min in two separate sessions with 24-hours interval. During stimulation, participants had to perform mental rotation test, picture test, and reading mind from eyes test for evaluation of mental rotation, perspective taking and mindreading in orderly. Three repeated-measure analysis of variance were used for analysis using SPSS 24.
Results: Findings showed the performance of mental rotation and perspective taking significantly improved under anodal stimulation over the rTPJ. The performance of mind reading was similar in both anodal and cathodal stimulation over the rTPJ.
Conclusion: The rTPJ is a common neural correlate of mental rotation and perspective taking. These two functions are structurally and functionally interwoven. The rTPJ is not an only decisive neural component of mind reading from eyes.

Key words: Mental rotation, perspective taking and mind reading, rTPJ, tDCS