Watching narratives of other people experiencing positive events, particularly survivors of hardship who received help, can activate brain areas associated with prosocial behaviors.

“What they did was interesting. Rather than have people express gratitude, they had the subjects go into the scanner, so their brains are being imaged, and they watched narratives, stories about other people experiencing positive things in their life. And in this case, these were powerful stories. These were stories about survivors of genocide. So, that's what they're watching.”