The neurophysiological basis of compassion: An fMRI meta-analysis of compassion and its related neural processes

•For the first time, we conducted a coordinates-based meta-analysis and review of functional imaging research in compassion.•From 16 studies, we identified common activation of seven regions which span frontal, salience, and midbrain regions.•Traditions in the literature consider compassion as either driven from emotion, mindset, or modulated by target characteristics or context.•We failed to identify certain regions commonly purported as relevant to compassion, likely due to studies which have utilized Loving-Kindness meditation.•We recommend future work consider clinical populations, computational methods, and measure concrete prosocial behavior.