Social cognitive and affective neuroscience最新文献

Anxiety can be adaptive, but at a cost. One theory suggests that whilst anxiety promotes harm-avoidant cognitive processing, it impairs concurrent (non-harm-related) processing by commandeering finite neurocognitive resources. Our previous work has shown that anxiety reliably 'speeds up time', promoting temporal underestimation, possibly due to a loss of temporal information. Whether this results from anxiety overloading neurocognitive systems involved in time processing remains unclear. Here, we examined whether anxiety and time processing overlap, particularly in regions of the cingulate cortex. Across two studies (an exploratory Study 1, N = 13, informing a pre-registered Study 2, N = 29), we combined a well-established anxiety manipulation (threat of shock) with a temporal bisection task while participants underwent fMRI. Consistent with our previous findings, time was perceived to pass more quickly under anxiety. Anxiety induction led to widespread activation in the cingulate cortex, while perceiving longer intervals was associated with more circumscribed activation in a mid-cingulate region. Importantly, conjunction analysis revealed convergence between anxiety and time processing in the insula and mid-cingulate cortex. These results tentatively support the idea that anxiety overloads already-engaged neural resources. In particular, overloading mid-cingulate capacity may drive emotion-related changes in temporal perception, consistent with its hypothesised role in mediating responses to anxiety.

The environment, especially social features, plays a key role in shaping the development of the brain, notably during adolescence. To better understand variation in brain-environment coupling and its associated outcomes, we identified ''social envirotypes,'' or different patterns of social environment experience, in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study by hierarchically clustering subjects. Two focal clusters, which accounted for 89.3% of all participants, differed significantly on eight out of nine youth-report social environment quality measures, representing almost perfect complements. We then applied tools from network neuroscience to show different social envirotypes are associated with different patterns of whole brain functional connectivity. Differences were distributed across the brain but were especially prominent in Default and Somatomotor Hand systems for these focal clusters. Finally, we examined how social envirotypes change over development and how these patterns of change are associated with a suite of outcomes. The resulting dynamic social envirotypes differed along dimensions of stability and quality, but outcomes diverged based on stability. Altogether, our findings represent significant contributions to both social developmental neuroscience and network neuroscience, emphasizing the variability and dynamicity of brain-environment coupling and its consequences.

Understanding the neural mechanisms underlying the impact of psychedelics on social perception and cognition may be instrumental to unravel their therapeutic potential. We conducted a pharmacoimaging study to examine ayahuasca's effects on a key theory of mind region, at the core of the third visual pathway (TVP) - the posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS), which is involved in facial emotion recognition and social perception. Twelve healthy participants (mean age: 40 ± 6.6 years; 4female) completed a crossover design with three conditions: 0.5 mg/kg DMT, 0.8 mg/kg DMT, and placebo, with 1-2 months washout intervals. Resting-state fMRI was used to assess pSTS functional and effective connectivity. The highest dose significantly increased right pSTS connectivity and directed modulation from visual (primary and extrastriate cortices) and mirror-neuron regions (supplementary motor cortex; SMC). Subjectively, this enhanced social cognitive states, with a strong positive correlation between pSTS-SMC connectivity and perspective-taking experiences. Additionally, ayahuasca produced positive psychological effects, including improved perceived social relationships, at one-week follow-up despite minimal acute effects. Our findings reveal a novel mechanism of action of psychedelics at early stages of social information processing, with enhanced integration of the TVP and mirror-neuron systems. The pSTS emerged as a critical hub supported by top-down and bottom-up evidence, providing a basis for understanding ayahuasca's prosocial therapeutic effects.

Infant crying is a fundamental communication signal that captures caregiver attention and elicits caregiving responses. Executive function (EF) is critical in managing the cognitive and emotional demands of parenting, particularly in processing infant cues. This study explored the relationship between experienced EF difficulties and neural responses to infant crying among biological birthing parents. Participants were pregnant individuals from the RISE project who completed the Behavioral Rating Inventory of Executive Function-Adult Version (BRIEF-A) during the third trimester. Postpartum, functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) measured brain activation in response to their own and other infants' cries, as well as control sounds. Greater experienced EF difficulties during pregnancy were prospectively associated with increased cry-evoked activation in lateral temporal regions, including a conjunction cluster in the left middle temporal gyrus shared across all four EF subdomains, and overlapping recruitment of regions such as the left superior temporal gyrus and right inferior frontal gyrus across multiple subdomains. These findings suggest that caregivers who report greater EF difficulties engage heightened auditory-temporal and control-related neural responses when processing infant distress signals, underscoring the relevance of EF-related individual differences for early parenting neurobiology.

This longitudinal study investigated the differential impacts of maternal speech on early socio-communicative development in infants at low likelihood (LL) and elevated likelihood (EL) of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Using functional near-infrared spectroscopy, we measured cortical responses and connectivity in 6-month-old infants while they listened to their mother's voice and an unfamiliar female voice. LL infants exhibited extensive cortical activation and robust connectivity in temporal and frontal regions, particularly in areas associated with voice processing, reward, and language functions. In contrast, EL infants showed minimal activation and weaker connectivity in these regions. Specifically, LL infants demonstrated significant connectivity between the superior temporal gyrus and the inferior frontal gyrus on the left side and between the orbitofrontal cortex and language areas, facilitating language processing and reward-related responses to maternal speech. These neural patterns were absent in EL infants, highlighting a neural basis for subsequent language delays. Furthermore, many of these reward-related or language-related networks predicted subsequent language development. Our findings underscore the importance of neural sensitivity to familiar human voices, regarding them as rewards that will eventually facilitate the acquisition of speech.

Neural processes distinguishing romantic love from opposite-sex friendships remain a key challenge in neuroscience. Research on monogamous prairie voles has revealed that the nucleus accumbens (NAcc) is pivotal for partner-specific processing through plastic changes. However, it remains unclear in humans whether the NAcc differentiates a partner from opposite-sex friends, and how partner-related processing changes as the relationship matures. In a sample of 47 heterosexual male participants, we investigated the neural representations of a female partner, a female friend, and a male friend, in the NAcc, caudate nucleus and putamen. We collected fMRI data from participants during a social incentive delay task designed to elicit neural responses in anticipation of social approval from each of them. Classifier-based multivoxel pattern analysis (MVPA) demonstrated that neural activity patterns in all three regions distinguished the female partner from the female friend. Importantly, similarity-based MVPA revealed that, in the NAcc, the female friend was represented closer to the male friend than to the partner. Furthermore, exploratory analyses indicated that individuals in longer romantic relationships presented less distinguishable neural responses between the partner and the female friend in the NAcc. These findings suggest partner-specific processing in the NAcc, with this specificity diminishing as the relationship matures.

Loneliness is associated with age-related health issues through its impact on the brain and body. The brain's allostatic-interoceptive system (AIS) consists of regions that predictively regulate bodily functions in reaction to affectively or socially salient situations. We hypothesized that loneliness would interact with age to exacerbate normative age-related differences in the static (i.e. average) and dynamic (i.e. time-varying) functional connectivity of the AIS during socially salient scenarios. Participants (N = 73) rated their loneliness and underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) during a task involving socially neutral, pleasant, and unpleasant conditions. Static and dynamic functional connectivity of the AIS were each quantified using participation coefficient (PC) and within-module degree (WD), which are graph-theoretical metrics indicating integration of the AIS with the rest of the brain and coherence within itself, respectively. Static AIS PC was positively associated with age across conditions. In the socially pleasant condition, static AIS WD decreased with increasing age, but only for those with high loneliness. In both the pleasant and unpleasant conditions, dynamic PC and WD showed steeper negative associations with age in individuals with higher loneliness. Overall, loneliness may exacerbate age-related differences in brain systems that are essential for physiological regulation and responding to social cues.

Social interaction relies on neurocognitive processes that support mutual prediction and coordination. Traditional neuroimaging investigates brain activity at the individual level, limiting insight into the reciprocal nature of social exchange. Hyperscanning overcomes this by simultaneously recording brain activity from interacting individuals. We conducted a systematic review of 28 functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) hyperscanning studies examining inter-brain coupling during interactive tasks. We assessed study features and examined whether paradigms included four key properties that make the use of hyperscanning particularly valuable over single-brain designs: real-time reciprocity, mutual information flow, unpredictability, and irreproducibility. Substantial methodological heterogeneity was observed, and only a few studies incorporated all four theoretically relevant features. To identify consistent spatial neural patterns of inter-brain coupling, we performed coordinate-based hierarchical clustering on residual (task-independent) and task-evoked coupling data. The latter was further analysed in relation to the complexity of the interaction. Residual coupling consistently involved the right posterior superior temporal gyrus, overlapping with the anterior temporo-parietal junction (TPJ), suggesting a role in spontaneous alignment. Task-evoked coupling differed by interactional complexity, with posterior temporal regions involved in low-complexity tasks, and medial frontal, mid-cingulate, and insular areas in high-complexity ones. These findings support the relevance of fMRI hyperscanning for studying inter-brain dynamics and inform future methodological development.

Research on anxiety focuses on clinically relevant behaviours and neurophysiological responses, particularly emphasizing recruitment of amygdala, insula, and cingulate cortex. Whether these same circuits instantiate subjective experience of anxiety remains unclear, a vital hurdle for clinical neuroscience. We used a semi-naturalistic, anxiogenic stimulus (animated movie) to evoke anxiety during fMRI in a pediatric sample with and without anxiety disorders (N = 84, before exclusion). After, participants provided verbal responses to interview questions about the stimulus. We quantified semantic content and valence of responses via natural language processing algorithms. Preregistered analyses found that wide-spread brain activity during the movie-including in the anterior insula cortex-related to participants' descriptions of the movie's narrative. Secondary analyses indicated anxiety symptoms were associated with insula responses, participants' descriptions of the movie's narrative, and appraisals. This study provides preliminary evidence that anxiety symptoms may shape patterns of insula activity during movie-watching, influencing the type of notable details later recalled. These findings underscore the utility of movie viewing paradigms in clinical neuroscience research on subjective emotional experiences in anxiety.