Brain responses to social norms: Meta-analyses of fMRI studies

Neural mechanisms of cooperation and fairness in iterative prisoner's dilemma

Cooperation is a universal human principle reflecting working with others to achieve common goals. The rational decision-making model contends that cooperation is the best strategy for maximizing benefits in an iterative prisoner's dilemma. However, the motivations for cooperation (or betrayal) are complex and diverse, and often include fairness reflections. In this study, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging to study underlying neural differences in brain regions related to fairness when people interact with an opponent who tend to cooperate or betray, at different decision-making stages. Results based on 40 university students (25 women) indicate that experiences of cooperation or betrayal affect people's fairness perception. Distinct neural activities occur in expectation, decision, and outcome phases of decisions. In the expectation phase, those in the cooperative condition exhibited increased activation in the anterior cingulate gyrus, medial superior frontal gyrus, and caudate nucleus compared to those in the uncooperative condition. During the decision phase, those in the cooperative condition showed greater activation in the middle frontal gyrus, caudate nucleus/frontal insula, inferior frontal gyrus, and cingulate gyrus compared to those in the uncooperative condition. In the outcome feedback phase, the caudate nucleus, insula, cingulate gyrus, and inferior frontal gyrus of the orbit were more active in the uncooperative condition than in the cooperative condition. Results also showed a significant correlation between caudate activity and the perception of fairness when expecting uncooperative conditions.

Age, but not education, affects social decision-making in the ultimatum game paradigm

BACKGROUND

 Social decision-making (SDM) is often studied through gaming paradigms, in which participants allocate resources among themselves and others based on predefined rules. In an adapted version of the ultimatum game (UG), SDM behavior was modulated in response to the degree of fairness of monetary offers and the social context of opponents, designed to generate either prosocial or punishing behaviors.

OBJECTIVE

 To investigate whether SDM evaluated by the UG is affected by age and schooling, as it is relevant to know whether sociodemographic variables may bias UG results.

METHODS

 A total of 131 healthy adults participated: 35 young university students and 96 participants in Universidade de São Paulo's USP 60+ program (formerly known as Universidade Aberta à Terceira Idade, a program for people aged ≥ 60 years to attend university). The sample was divided into 3 age groups (17-22, 60-69, and 70-79 years) and 3 schooling groups (4-8, 9-11, and ≥ 12 years of schooling).

RESULTS

 Age and schooling did not affect performance in fair monetary offers. Differences were observed in the unfair conditions. The oldest group (70-79 years) accepted less frequently the baseline unfair offers (without social context), when compared with the 17-22 and the 60-69 years groups (17-22 = 60-69 > 70-79). Regarding the prosocial unfair and punishing unfair conditions, older adults accepted such offers more frequently (17-22 < 60-69 = 70-79). Schooling effects were not observed.

CONCLUSION

 In the context of SDM, older adults may show prosocial behaviors more frequently than younger adults. The findings suggest performance in the UG is affected by age, but not by schooling.

Consensus Paper: Cerebellum and Reward

Cerebellum is a key-structure for the modulation of motor, cognitive, social and affective functions, contributing to automatic behaviours through interactions with the cerebral cortex, basal ganglia and spinal cord. The predictive mechanisms used by the cerebellum cover not only sensorimotor functions but also reward-related tasks. Cerebellar circuits appear to encode temporal difference error and reward prediction error. From a chemical standpoint, cerebellar catecholamines modulate the rate of cerebellar-based cognitive learning, and mediate cerebellar contributions during complex behaviours. Reward processing and its associated emotions are tuned by the cerebellum which operates as a controller of adaptive homeostatic processes based on interoceptive and exteroceptive inputs. Lobules VI-VII/areas of the vermis are candidate regions for the cortico-subcortical signaling pathways associated with loss aversion and reward sensitivity, together with other nodes of the limbic circuitry. There is growing evidence that the cerebellum works as a hub of regional dysconnectivity across all mood states and that mental disorders involve the cerebellar circuitry, including mood and addiction disorders, and impaired eating behaviors where the cerebellum might be involved in longer time scales of prediction as compared to motor operations. Cerebellar patients exhibit aberrant social behaviour, showing aberrant impulsivity/compulsivity. The cerebellum is a master-piece of reward mechanisms, together with the striatum, ventral tegmental area (VTA) and prefrontal cortex (PFC). Critically, studies on reward processing reinforce our view that a fundamental role of the cerebellum is to construct internal models, perform predictions on the impact of future behaviour and compare what is predicted and what actually occurs.

Imagination vs. routines: festive time, weekly time, and the predictive brain

This paper examines the relationship between societal structures shaped by traditions, norms, laws, and customs, and creative expressions in arts and media through the lens of the predictive coding framework in cognitive science. The article proposes that both dimensions of culture can be viewed as adaptations designed to enhance and train the brain's predictive abilities in the social domain. Traditions, norms, laws, and customs foster shared predictions and expectations among individuals, thereby reducing uncertainty in social environments. On the other hand, arts and media expose us to simulated experiences that explore alternative social realities, allowing the predictive machinery of the brain to hone its skills through exposure to a wider array of potentially relevant social circumstances and scenarios. We first review key principles of predictive coding and active inference, and then explore the rationale of cultural traditions and artistic culture in this perspective. Finally, we draw parallels between institutionalized normative habits that stabilize social worlds and creative and imaginative acts that temporarily subvert established conventions to inject variability.

One step too far: social cerebellum in norm-violating navigation

Social norms are pivotal in guiding social interactions. The current study investigated the potential contribution of the posterior cerebellum, a critical region involved in perceiving and comprehending the sequential dynamics of social actions, in detecting actions that either conform to or deviate from social norms. Participants engaged in a goal-directed task in which they observed others navigating towards a goal. The trajectories demonstrated either norm-violating (trespassing forbidden zones) or norm-following behaviors (avoiding forbidden zones). Results revealed that observing social norm-violating behaviors engaged the bilateral posterior cerebellar Crus 2 and the right temporoparietal junction (TPJ) from the mentalizing network, and the parahippocampal gyrus (PHG) to a greater extent than observing norm-following behaviors. These mentalizing regions were also activated when comparing social sequences against non-social and non-sequential control conditions. Reproducing norm-violating social trajectories observed earlier, activated the left cerebellar Crus 2 and the right PHG compared to reproducing norm-following trajectories. These findings illuminate the neural mechanisms in the cerebellum associated with detecting norm transgressions during social navigation, emphasizing the role of the posterior cerebellum in detecting and signaling deviations from anticipated sequences.

Neural asymmetry in aligning with generous versus selfish descriptive norms in a charitable donation task

Social alignment is supported by the brain's reward system (ventral striatum), presumably because attaining synchrony generates feelings of connectedness. However, this may hold only for aligning with generous others, while aligning with selfishness might threaten social connectedness. We investigated this postulated asymmetry in an incentivized fMRI charitable donation task. Participants decided how much of their endowment to donate to real charities, and how much to keep for themselves. Compared to a baseline condition, donations significantly increased or decreased in function of the presence of descriptive norms. The fMRI data reveal that processing selfish norms (more than generous ones) recruited the amygdala and anterior insula. Aligning with selfish norms correlated on average with reduced activity in the lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) and, at the individual level, with decreasing activity in the ventral striatum (VS). Conversely, as participants aligned more with generous norms, they showed increasing activity in the LPFC and, on average, increased activity in the VS. This increase occurred beyond the increased VS activity which was also observed in the baseline condition. Taken together, this suggests that aligning with generosity, while effortful, provides a "warm glow of herding" associated with collective giving, but that aligning with selfishness does not.

The prefrontal cortex: from monkey to man

The prefrontal cortex is so important to human beings that, if deprived of it, our behaviour is reduced to action-reactions and automatisms, with no ability to make deliberate decisions. Why does the prefrontal cortex hold such importance in humans? In answer, this review draws on the proximity between humans and other primates, which enables us, through comparative anatomical-functional analysis, to understand the cognitive functions we have in common and specify those that distinguish humans from their closest cousins. First, a focus on the lateral region of the prefrontal cortex illustrates the existence of a continuum between rhesus monkeys (the most studied primates in neuroscience) and humans for most of the major cognitive functions in which this region of the brain plays a central role. This continuum involves the presence of elementary mental operations in the rhesus monkey (e.g. working memory or response inhibition) that are constitutive of 'macro-functions' such as planning, problem-solving and even language production. Second, the human prefrontal cortex has developed dramatically compared to that of other primates. This increase seems to concern the most anterior part (the frontopolar cortex). In humans, the development of the most anterior prefrontal cortex is associated with three major and interrelated cognitive changes: (i) a greater working memory capacity, allowing for greater integration of past experiences and prospective futures; (ii) a greater capacity to link discontinuous or distant data, whether temporal or semantic; and (iii) a greater capacity for abstraction, allowing humans to classify knowledge in different ways, to engage in analogical reasoning or to acquire abstract values that give rise to our beliefs and morals. Together, these new skills enable us, among other things, to develop highly sophisticated social interactions based on language, enabling us to conceive beliefs and moral judgements and to conceptualize, create and extend our vision of our environment beyond what we can physically grasp. Finally, a model of the transition of prefrontal functions between humans and non-human primates concludes this review.

The science of justice: The neuropsychology of social punishment

The social punishment (SP) of norm violations has received much attention across multiple disciplines. However, current models of SP fail to consider the role of motivational processes, and none can explain the observed behavioral and neuropsychological differences between the two recognized forms of SP: second-party punishment (2PP) and third-party punishment (3PP). After reviewing the literature giving rise to the current models of SP, we propose a unified model of SP which integrates general psychological descriptions of decision-making as a confluence of affect, cognition, and motivation, with evidence that SP is driven by two main factors: the amount of harm (assessed primarily in the salience network) and the norm violator's intention (assessed primarily in the default-mode and central-executive networks). We posit that motivational differences between 2PP and 3PP, articulated in mesocorticolimbic pathways, impact final SP by differentially impacting the assessments of harm and intention done in these domain-general large-scale networks. This new model will lead to a better understanding of SP, which might even improve forensic, procedural, and substantive legal practices.

Leader-follower behavioural coordination and neural synchronization during intergroup conflict

Leaders can launch hostile attacks on out-groups and organize in-group defence. Whether groups settle the conflict in their favour depends, however, on whether followers align with leader's initiatives. Yet how leader and followers coordinate during intergroup conflict remains unknown. Participants in small groups elected a leader and made costly contributions to intergroup conflict while dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) activity was simultaneously measured. Leaders were more sacrificial and their contribution influenced group survival to a greater extent during in-group defence than during out-group attacks. Leaders also had increased DLPFC activity when defending in-group, which predicted their comparatively strong contribution to conflict; followers reciprocated their leader's initiatives the more their DLPFC activity synchronized with that of their leader. When launching attacks, however, leaders and followers aligned poorly at behavioural and neural levels, which explained why out-group attacks often failed. Our results provide a neurobehavioural account of leader-follower coordination during intergroup conflict and reveal leader-follower behavioural/neural alignment as pivotal for groups settling conflicts in their favour.

Higher subjective socioeconomic status is linked to increased charitable giving and mentalizing-related neural value coding

Socioeconomic status (SES), a concept related to an individual's economic and social position relative to others, can shape social interactions like altruistic behaviors. However, little is known about the exact neurocognitive mechanisms that link SES with altruism. Our study aimed to provide a comprehensive account of the sociocognitive and neural mechanisms through which SES affects charitable giving - an important variant of human altruism. To this end, participants completed a charitable donation task while their brain activity was measured using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We also assessed participants' socio-cognitive ability to infer other people's mental states (i.e., mentalizing) - a driver of prosocial behavior - in an independent social task. Behaviorally, we found that both charitable giving and social cognition were status-dependent, as subjective SES positively predicted donations and mentalizing capacity. Moreover, the link between SES and charitable giving was mediated by individuals' mentalizing capacity. At the neural level, a multivariate pattern analysis of fMRI data revealed that higher subjective SES was associated with stronger value coding in the right temporoparietal junction (rTPJ). The strength of this value representation predicted charitable giving and was linked to mentalizing. Furthermore, we observed an increased negative functional coupling between rTPJ and left putamen with higher SES. Together, increased charitable giving in higher-status individuals could be explained by status-dependent recruitment of mentalizing-related value coding and altered functional connectivity in the brain. Our findings provide insights into the socio- and neurocognitive mechanisms explaining why and when higher SES leads to prosociality, which might ultimately inform targeted interventions to promote prosocial behavior in human societies.

How we learn social norms: a three-stage model for social norm learning

As social animals, humans are unique to make the world function well by developing, maintaining, and enforcing social norms. As a prerequisite among these norm-related processes, learning social norms can act as a basis that helps us quickly coordinate with others, which is beneficial to social inclusion when people enter into a new environment or experience certain sociocultural changes. Given the positive effects of learning social norms on social order and sociocultural adaptability in daily life, there is an urgent need to understand the underlying mechanisms of social norm learning. In this article, we review a set of works regarding social norms and highlight the specificity of social norm learning. We then propose an integrated model of social norm learning containing three stages, i.e., pre-learning, reinforcement learning, and internalization, map a potential brain network in processing social norm learning, and further discuss the potential influencing factors that modulate social norm learning. Finally, we outline a couple of future directions along this line, including theoretical (i.e., societal and individual differences in social norm learning), methodological (i.e., longitudinal research, experimental methods, neuroimaging studies), and practical issues.

Clinical Assessment of Judgment in Adults and the Elderly: Development and Validation of the Three Domains of Judgment Test-Clinical Version (3DJT-CV)

(1) Background: This article discusses the first two phases of development and validation of the Three Domains of Judgment Test (3DJT). This computer-based tool, co-constructed with users and capable of being administered remotely, aims to assess the three main domains of judgment (practical, moral, and social) and learn from the psychometric weaknesses of tests currently used in clinical practice. (2) Method: First, we presented the 3DJT to experts in cognition, who evaluated the tool as a whole as well as the content validity, relevance, and acceptability of 72 scenarios. Second, an improved version was administered to 70 subjects without cognitive impairment to select scenarios with the best psychometric properties in order to build a future clinically short version of the test. (3) Results: Fifty-six scenarios were retained following expert evaluation. Results support the idea that the improved version has good internal consistency, and the concurrent validity primer shows that 3DJT is a good measure of judgment. Furthermore, the improved version was found to have a significant number of scenarios with good psychometric properties to prepare a clinical version of the test. (4) Conclusion: The 3DJT is an interesting alternative tool for assessing judgment. However, more studies are needed for its implementation in a clinical context.

Factors influencing adolescent experimental and current smoking behaviors based on social cognitive theory: A cross-sectional study in Xiamen

Introduction

China has the largest youth population in the world. To better implement the Smoke-free School Initiative, this study aims to examine the protective and risk factors for different smoking behaviors (never smoked, experimental smoking, and current smoking) among school adolescents based on social cognitive theory.

Methods

This research was a secondary analysis of a cross-sectional survey of middle schools in Huli District of Xiamen, China. The final sample consisted of 1937 participants with an average age of 15.41 (SD = 1.64). Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the sociodemographic characteristics of the sample. Multivariate multinomial logistic regression analysis was performed using four models.

Results

Of the respondents, 1685 (86.99%) were never smokers, 210 (10.84%) were experimental smokers, and 42 (2.17%) were current smokers. Social norms, positive outcome expectations, anti-smoking self-efficacy, and attitudes toward control tobacco policies were associated with adolescents' smoking behaviors. The number of smoking family members, classmates smoking, the perception that smoking is cool and attractive, and attitudes toward control tobacco policies were the predictors of current smoking behavior (p < 0.05). In contrast, friends smoking and individual and social relationship motivation were associated with only experimental smoking (p < 0.05).

Discussion

The relationship of social norms, positive outcome expectations, anti-smoking self-efficacy, and attitudes toward control tobacco policies varied across smoking behaviors. Family, school, society and the government need to cooperate in prevention and intervention programs for adolescent smoking. The relationships between these factors and adolescents' different smoking behaviors needs to be further verified.

Why help others? Insights from rodent to human early childhood research

Helping behavior are actions aiming at assisting another individual in need or to relieve their distress. The occurrence of this behavior not only depends on automated physiological mechanisms, such as imitation or emotional contagion, that is, the individual's emotion and physiological state matching with others, but also needs motivation to sustain. From a comparative and developmental perspective, we discover that the motivation for helping behavior has a deep foundation both phylogenetically and ontogenetically. For example, empathic concern for others, relieving personal distress and the desire for social contact are universal motivations across rodents, non-human primates and human early childhoods. Therefore, a circle-layered model integrating evidences for motivation for helping behavior from rodent to human early childhood research is proposed: the inner circle contains the emotional-behavioral system and the outer circle contains the affective-cognitive system. The application of this model has significance for both behavioral neuroscience research and cultivating prosocial behavior in human society.

Neural mechanisms of brand love relationship dynamics: Is the development of brand love relationships the same as that of interpersonal romantic love relationships?

Brand love is a relationship between brands and consumers. Managing the relationship is an important issue for marketing strategy since it changes according to temporal flow. Brand love theories, including their dynamics, have been developed based on interpersonal romantic love theories. Although many brand love studies have provided useful findings, the neural mechanism of brand love remains unclear. Especially, its dynamics have not been considered from a neuroscience perspective. The present study addressed the commonalities and differentiations of activated brain regions between brand love and interpersonal romantic love relationships using a quantitative neuroimaging meta-analytic approach, from the view of brain connectivity. Regarding the mental processes of each love relationship related to these activated brain regions, decoding analysis was conducted using the NeuroQuery platform to prevent reverse inference. The results revealed that different neural mechanisms and mental processes were distinctively involved in the dynamics of each love relationship, although the anterior insula overlapped across all stages and the reinforcement learning system was driven between both love relationships in the early stage. Remarkably, regarding the distinctive mental processes, although prosocial aspects were involved in the mental processes of interpersonal romantic love relationships across all stages, they were not involved in the mental processes of brand love relationships. Conclusively, although common brain regions and mental processes between both love relationships were observed, neural mechanisms and mental processes in brand love relationship dynamics might be innately different from those in the interpersonal romantic love relationship dynamics. As this finding indicates essential distinctiveness between both these relationships, theories concerning interpersonal romantic love should be applied cautiously when investigating brand love relationship dynamics.

Trust-Based Decision-Making in the Health Context Discriminates Biological Risk Profiles in Type 1 Diabetes

Theoretical accounts on social decision-making under uncertainty postulate that individual risk preferences are context dependent. Generalization of models of decision-making to dyadic interactions in the personal health context remain to be experimentally addressed. In economic utility-based models, interactive behavioral games provide a framework to investigate probabilistic learning of sequential reinforcement. Here, we model an economic trust game in the context of a chronic disease (Diabetes Type 1) which involves iterated daily decisions in complex social contexts. Ninety-one patients performed experimental trust games in both economic and health settings and were characterized by a multiple self-report set of questionnaires. We found that although our groups can correctly infer pay-off contingencies, they behave differently because patients with a biological profile of preserved glycemic control show adaptive choice behavior both in economic and health domains. On the other hand, patients with a biological profile of loss of glycemic control presented a contrasting behavior, showing non-adaptive choices on both contexts. These results provide a direct translation from neuroeconomics to decision-making in the health domain and biological risk profiles, in a behavioral setting that requires difficult and self-consequential decisions with health impact. Our findings also provide a contextual generalization of mechanisms underlying individual decision-making under uncertainty.

Non-invasive vagus nerve stimulation in epilepsy patients enhances cooperative behavior in the prisoner's dilemma task

The vagus nerve constitutes a key link between the autonomic and the central nervous system. Previous studies provide evidence for the impact of vagal activity on distinct cognitive processes including functions related to social cognition. Recent studies in animals and humans show that vagus nerve stimulation is associated with enhanced reward-seeking and dopamine-release in the brain. Social interaction recruits similar brain circuits to reward processing. We hypothesize that vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) boosts rewarding aspects of social behavior and compare the impact of transcutaneous VNS (tVNS) and sham stimulation on social interaction in 19 epilepsy patients in a double-blind pseudo-randomized study with cross-over design. Using a well-established paradigm, i.e., the prisoner’s dilemma, we investigate effects of stimulation on cooperative behavior, as well as interactions of stimulation effects with patient characteristics. A repeated-measures ANOVA and a linear mixed-effects model provide converging evidence that tVNS boosts cooperation. Post-hoc correlations reveal that this effect varies as a function of neuroticism, a personality trait linked to the dopaminergic system. Behavioral modeling indicates that tVNS induces a behavioral starting bias towards cooperation, which is independent of the decision process. This study provides evidence for the causal influence of vagus nerve activity on social interaction.

The Role of the Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex in Public Good and Public Bad Games: Evidence From a tDCS Study

Although humans constitute an exceptionally cooperative species that is able to collaborate on large scales for common benefits, cooperation remains a longstanding puzzle in biological and social science. Moreover, cooperation is not always related to resource allocation and gains but is often related to losses. Revealing the neurological mechanisms and brain regions related to cooperation is important for reinforcing cooperation-related gains and losses. Recent neuroscience studies have found that the decision-making process of cooperation is involved in the function of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC). In the present study, we aimed to investigate the causal role of the VMPFC in cooperative behavior concerning gains and losses through the application of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). We integrated cooperation-related gains and losses into a unified paradigm. Based on the paradigm, we researched cooperation behaviors regarding gains in standard public good games and introduced public bad games to investigate cooperative behavior regarding losses. Our study revealed that the VMPFC plays different roles concerning gains and losses in situations requiring cooperation. Anodal stimulation over the VMPFC decreased cooperative behavior in public bad games, whereas stimulation over the VMPFC did not change cooperative behavior in public good games. Moreover, participants’ beliefs about others’ cooperation were changed in public bad games but not in public good games. Finally, participants’ cooperative attitudes were not influenced in the public good or public bad games under the three stimulation conditions.

Mapping working memory-specific dysfunction using a transdiagnostic approach

Background

Working memory (WM) is an executive ability that allows one to hold and manipulate information for a short period of time. Schizophrenia and mood disorders are severe psychiatric conditions with overlapping genetic and clinical symptoms. Whilst WM has been suggested as meeting the criteria for being an endophenotype for schizophrenia and mood disorders, it still unclear whether they share overlapping neural circuitry.

Objective

The n-back task has been widely used to measure WM capacity, such as maintenance, flexible updating, and interference control. Here we compiled studies that included psychiatric populations, i.e., schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and major depressive disorder.

Methods

We performed a coordinate-based meta-analysis that combined 34 BOLD-fMRI studies comparing activity associated with n-back working memory between psychiatric patients and healthy controls. We specifically focused our search using the n-back task to diminish study heterogeneity.

Results

All patient groups showed blunted activity in the striatum, anterior insula and frontal lobe. The same brain networks related to WM were compromised in schizophrenia, major depressive disorder and bipolar disorder.

Conclusion

Our findings support the suggestion of commonal functional abnormalities across schizophrenia and mood disorders related to WM.

A Feature-Based Network Analysis and fMRI Meta-Analysis Reveal Three Distinct Types of Prosocial Decisions

Tasks that measure correlates of prosocial decision-making share one common feature: agents can make choices that increase the welfare of a beneficiary. However, prosocial decisions vary widely as a function of other task features. The diverse ways that prosociality is defined and the heterogeneity of prosocial decisions have created challenges for interpreting findings across studies and identifying their neural correlates. To overcome these challenges, we aimed to organize the prosocial decision-making task space of neuroimaging studies. We conducted a systematic search for studies in which participants made decisions to increase the welfare of others during functional magnetic resonance imaging. We identified shared and distinct features of these tasks and employed an unsupervised graph-based approach to assess how various forms of prosocial decision-making are related in terms of their low-level components (e.g. task features like potential cost to the agent or potential for reciprocity). Analyses uncovered three clusters of prosocial decisions, which we labeled as cooperation, equity and altruism. This feature-based representation of the task structure was supported by results of a neuroimaging meta-analysis that each type of prosocial decisions recruited diverging neural systems. Results clarify some of the existing heterogeneity in how prosociality is conceptualized and generate insight for future research and task paradigm development.

Shame on the brain: Neural correlates of moral injury event recall in posttraumatic stress disorder

BACKGROUND

Moral injury (MI) is consistently associated with adverse mental health outcomes, including the development of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and suicidality.

METHODS

We investigated neural activation patterns associated with MI event recall using functional magnetic resonance imaging in participants with military and public safety-related PTSD, relative to civilian MI-exposed controls.

RESULTS

MI recall in the PTSD as compared to control group was associated with increased neural activation among salience network nodes involved in viscerosensory processing and hyperarousal (right posterior insula, dorsal anterior cingulate cortex; dACC), regions involved in defensive responding (left postcentral gyrus), and areas responsible for top-down cognitive control of emotions (left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex; dlPFC). Within the PTSD group, measures of state and trait shame correlated negatively with activity among default mode network regions associated with self-related processing and moral cognition (dorsomedial prefrontal cortex; dmPFC) and salience network regions associated with viscerosensory processing (left posterior insula), respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings suggest that MI event processing is altered in military and public safety-related PTSD, relative to MI-exposed controls. Here, it appears probable that as individuals with PTSD recall their MI event, they experience a surge of blame-related processing of bodily sensations within salience network regions, including the right posterior insula and the dACC, which in turn, prompt regulatory strategies at the level of the left dlPFC aimed at increasing cognitive control and inhibiting emotional affect. These results are consistent with previous findings showing enhanced sensory processing and altered top-down control in PTSD samples during autobiographical memory recall.

Racial Ingroup Bias and Efficiency Consideration Influence Distributive Decisions: A Dynamic Analysis of Time Domain and Time Frequency

Although previous studies have demonstrated that identity had effect on justice norms and behavioral decisions, the neural mechanism of that effect remains unclear. In this study, the subjects made their distributive decisions on the trade-off between equity and efficiency among Chinese and foreign children and their scalp potentials were recorded. Behavioral results showed that efficiency consideration played an important part in the distribution task. Meanwhile, participants gave preferential treatment to same-race children. Relative to the distribution within ingroup children, the distribution involving outgroup children induced higher N170 amplitude. The distribution involving outgroup children also elicited weakened P300 amplitude and enhanced delta response than the distribution within ingroup children when subjects are facing the conflict between equality and efficiency. In other words, ingroup bias affected the neural process of the trade-off between equality and efficiency. The combination of time-domain and time-frequency analyses provided spatiotemporal and spectral results for a better understanding of racial ingroup favoritism on distributive justice.

Abnormal prediction error processing in schizophrenia and depression

To make adaptive decisions under uncertainty, individuals need to actively monitor the discrepancy between expected outcomes and actual outcomes, known as prediction errors. Reward‐based learning deficits have been shown in both depression and schizophrenia patients. For this study, we compiled studies that investigated prediction error processing in depression and schizophrenia patients and performed a series of meta‐analyses. In both groups, positive t‐maps of prediction error tend to yield striatum activity across studies. The analysis of negative t‐maps of prediction error revealed two large clusters within the right superior and inferior frontal lobes in schizophrenia and the medial prefrontal cortex and bilateral insula in depression. The concordant posterior cingulate activity was observed in both patient groups, more prominent in the depression group and absent in the healthy control group. These findings suggest a possible role in dopamine‐rich areas associated with the encoding of prediction errors in depression and schizophrenia.

Common brain networks underlying human social interactions: Evidence from large-scale neuroimaging meta-analysis

Recent overarching frameworks propose that various human social interactions are commonly supported by a set of fundamental neuropsychological processes, including social cognition, motivation, and cognitive control. However, it remains unclear whether brain networks implicated in these functional constructs are consistently engaged in diverse social interactions. Based on ample evidence from human brain imaging studies (342 contrasts, 7234 participants, 3328 foci), we quantitatively synthesized brain areas involved in broad domains of social interactions, including social interactions versus non-social contexts, positive/negative aspects of social interactions, social learning, and social norms. We then conducted brain network analysis on the ensuing brain regions and characterized the psychological function profiles of identified brain networks. Our findings revealed that brain regions consistently involved in diverse social interactions mapped onto default mode network, salience network, subcortical network and central executive network, which were respectively implicated in social cognition, motivation and cognitive control. These findings implicate a heuristic integrative framework to understand human social life from the perspective of component process and network integration.

How higher goals are constructed and collapse under stress: A hierarchical Bayesian control systems perspective

In this paper, we show that organisms can be modeled as hierarchical Bayesian control systems with small world and information bottleneck (bow-tie) network structure. Such systems combine hierarchical perception with hierarchical goal setting and hierarchical action control. We argue that hierarchical Bayesian control systems produce deep hierarchies of goal states, from which it follows that organisms must have some form of 'highest goals'. For all organisms, these involve internal (self) models, external (social) models and overarching (normative) models. We show that goal hierarchies tend to decompose in a top-down manner under severe and prolonged levels of stress. This produces behavior that favors short-term and self-referential goals over long term, social and/or normative goals. The collapse of goal hierarchies is universally accompanied by an increase in entropy (disorder) in control systems that can serve as an early warning sign for tipping points (disease or death of the organism). In humans, learning goal hierarchies corresponds to personality development (maturation). The failure of goal hierarchies to mature properly corresponds to personality deficits. A top-down collapse of such hierarchies under stress is identified as a common factor in all forms of episodic mental disorders (psychopathology). The paper concludes by discussing ways of testing these hypotheses empirically.

The paradoxical decline and growth of trust as a function of borderline personality disorder trait count: Using discontinuous growth modelling to examine trust dynamics in response to violation and repair

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is associated with paradoxical trust cognitions and behaviours. While BPD is associated with difficulty forming trust and maintaining cooperation in trust-based exchanges, design and analytical methodology best suited to reveal the temporal ebb and flow of trust have been underutilized. We used an economic game to examine the trajectories of trust as it forms, dissolves, and restores in response to trust violation and repair, and to explain how these vary as a function of borderline pathology. Young adults (N = 234) played a 15-round trust game in which partner trustworthiness was varied to create three phases: trust formation, trust violation, and trust restoration. Discontinuous growth modelling was employed to capture the trends in trust over time and their relationship with BPD trait count. BPD trait count was associated with an incongruous pattern of trust behaviour in the form of declining trust when interacting with a new and cooperative partner, and paradoxically, increasing trust following multiple instances of trust violation by that partner. BPD trait count was also associated with trust restoring at a faster rate than it was originally formed. By adopting a methodology that recognizes the dynamic nature of trust, this study illustrated at a micro level how relational disturbances may be produced and maintained in those with a moderate to high BPD trait count. Further investigation of the factors and processes that underlie these incongruous trust dynamics is recommended.

Morality in advertising: An fMRI study on persuasion in communication

Advertising slogans serve the function of persuasive communication by presenting catchy phrases. To decide whether a slogan is convincing or not, cognitive reasoning is assumed to be complemented by a more implicit and intuitive route of information processing, presumably similar to evaluating normative judgments in moral statements. We employed functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) while Western male subjects judged advertising slogans and moral statements as another decision task with subjective nature. Compared to a neutral control condition that targeted declarative memory and to an aesthetic-related condition, the evaluation processes in both domains engaged the anterior medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), which is associated with decision-making incorporating personal value. Conjoint activations were also observed in the left temporoparietal junction (TPJ) when compared to the aesthetics condition. Results are discussed with reference to domain-independence, a suspected difference to aesthetic-like appreciations, and functional organization in the mPFC and the TPJ.

The emerging neuroscience of social punishment: Meta-analytic evidence

Social punishment (SOP)-third-party punishment (TPP) and second-party punishment (SPP)-sanctions norm-deviant behavior. The hierarchical punishment model (HPM) posits that TPP is an extension of SPP and both recruit common processes engaging large-scale domain-general brain networks. Here, we provided meta-analytic evidence to the HPM by combining the activation likelihood estimation approach with connectivity analyses and hierarchical clustering analyses. Although both forms of SOP engaged the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and bilateral anterior insula (AI), a functional differentiation also emerged with TPP preferentially engaging social cognitive regions (temporoparietal junction) and SPP affective regions (AI). Further, although both TPP and SPP recruit domain-general networks (salience, default-mode, and central-executive networks), some specificity in network organization was observed. By revealing differences and commonalities of the neural networks consistently activated by different types of SOP, our findings contribute to a better understanding of the neuropsychological mechanisms of social punishment behavior--one of the most peculiar human behaviors.

Neural Correlates of Self-Construal Priming in the Ultimatum Game

Research from cultural and social psychology has identified a central role of self-construal, or the way one views themselves in relation to others, in social cognition. Accordingly, it is plausible that self-construal plays an instrumental role in important aspects of decision-making relating to fairness considerations. Prior research has shown that priming methodology is a useful tool to experimentally isolate the effect of self-construal on social decision-making processes. In the current study we investigated the neural effects of self-construal priming on fairness considerations, using an Ultimatum Game setup (N = 97). Based on previous findings, we predicted an interaction between the self-construal prime and gender on Ultimatum Game behavior; males primed with interdependence would reject the offer relatively more compared to independence, and vice versa for females. As previous neuro-imaging research has established an instrumental role of the anterior insula (AI) and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) in the rejection of unfair offers, we expected higher rejection rates to be mirrored by increased activity in these regions. However, the analyses did not confirm these predictions. As further inspection of the data revealed a habituation effect, we performed a follow-up analysis on the first block (N = 59). This subsequent analysis revealed that priming interdependence resulted in reduced AI activity compared to priming independence, although no behavioral differences were observed. The difference was theorized to result from motivations as conflict avoidance and harmony maintenance, commonly associated with interdependence. Furthermore, the analysis revealed greater vmPFC activity for females compared to males for rejected offers, although this effect was not robust when controlled for trait self-construal. These follow-up analyses suggest that self-construal priming influences insula activity, as well as implicating an underlying role of trait self-construal in observed gender differences in vmPFC activity relating to fairness considerations.

Brain responses to social punishment: a meta-analysis

Many studies suggest that social punishment is beneficial for cooperation and consequently maintaining the social norms in society. Neuroimaging and brain stimulation studies show that the brain regions which respond to violations of social norms, the understanding of the mind of others and the executive functions, are involved during social punishment. Despite the rising number of studies on social punishment, the concordant map of activations - the set of key regions responsible for the general brain response to social punishment - is still unknown. By using coordinate-based fMRI meta-analysis, the present study examined the concordant map of neural activations associated with various social punishment tasks. A total of 17 articles with 18 contrasts including 383 participants, equalling 191 foci were included in activation likelihood estimation (ALE) analysis. The majority of the studies (61%) employed the widely used neuroeconomic paradigms, such as fairness-related norm tasks (Ultimatum Game, third-party punishment game), while the remaining tasks reported criminal scenarios evaluation and social rejection tasks. The analysis revealed concordant activation in the bilateral claustrum, right interior frontal and left superior frontal gyri. This study provides an integrative view on brain responses to social punishment.

Are you really cursing? Neural processing of taboo words in native and foreign language

The use of socially opprobrious words (taboo words) is a cross-cultural phenomenon occurring between individuals from almost all social extractions. The neurocognitive correlates of using taboo words in the native language (L1) as compared to their use in a second (L2) language are largely unknown. We used fMRI to investigate the processing of taboo and non-taboo stimuli in monolinguals (Experiment 1) and highly proficient bilinguals (Experiment 2) engaged in lexical decision tasks. We report that for L1 socio-pragmatic knowledge is automatically conveyed and taboo words are processed with less effort than non-taboo words. For L2 the processing of taboo words is more effortful and engages additional structures (anterior cingulate cortex, insula) involved in social-norm representation and evaluation. Our results contribute to understand the interface between language and social-norm processing indicating that lexical processing is affected by socio-pragmatic knowledge, but only when the speaker has a contextual use of the language.

The lateral prefrontal cortex and moral goal pursuit

In the face of competing desires, humans often strive to be fair, honest, and considerate of others. Research from social neuroscience implicates the lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) in our capacity to pursue such goals, yet its precise computational role is less clear. Here, we draw on insights from the neuroscience of hierarchical control and value-based choice to offer an integrative look at how LPFC supports the pursuit of moral goals. We conclude by highlighting how future work may leverage these insights to deepen our understanding of the dynamic neural code of morality.

Brain Responses to Dynamic Facial Expressions: A Normative Meta-Analysis

Identifying facial expressions is crucial for social interactions. Functional neuroimaging studies show that a set of brain areas, such as the fusiform gyrus and amygdala, become active when viewing emotional facial expressions. The majority of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies investigating face perception typically employ static images of faces. However, studies that use dynamic facial expressions (e.g., videos) are accumulating and suggest that a dynamic presentation may be more sensitive and ecologically valid for investigating faces. By using quantitative fMRI meta-analysis the present study examined concordance of brain regions associated with viewing dynamic facial expressions. We analyzed data from 216 participants that participated in 14 studies, which reported coordinates for 28 experiments. Our analysis revealed bilateral fusiform and middle temporal gyri, left amygdala, left declive of the cerebellum and the right inferior frontal gyrus. These regions are discussed in terms of their relation to models of face processing.

Social Support Modulates Neural Responses to Unfairness in the Ultimatum Game

The current functional MRI study aimed to investigate how responders' fairness considerations and related decision-making processes were affected by social support in the ultimatum game (UG). During scanning, responders either played the standard UG with proposers (control condition) or played the modified UG in which three unknown observers showed social support for responders by acknowledging proposers' norm violation. Results revealed that participants reported higher unfairness feelings and rejection rates of unfair offers in the social support condition relative to the control condition. At the neural level, compared to the control condition, perception of social support from others induced greater activations of anterior cingulate gyrus and right anterior insula when receiving unfair (vs. fair) offers. The medial prefrontal cortex and right anterior insula were more active when the unfair offers were rejected (vs. accepted) in the social support condition than the control condition. These results highlighted the modulation effect of social support on responders' fairness considerations and related decision-making processes.

Brain responses to social norms: Meta-analyses of fMRI studies

Social norms have a critical role in everyday decision-making, as frequent interaction with others regulates our behavior. Neuroimaging studies show that social-based and fairness-related decision-making activates an inconsistent set of areas, which sometimes includes the anterior insula, anterior cingulate cortex, and others lateral prefrontal cortices. Social-based decision-making is complex and variability in findings may be driven by socio-cognitive activities related to social norms. To distinguish among social-cognitive activities related to social norms, we identified 36 eligible articles in the functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) literature, which we separate into two categories (a) social norm representation and (b) norm violations. The majority of original articles (>60%) used tasks associated with fairness norms and decision-making, such as ultimatum game, dictator game, or prisoner's dilemma; the rest used tasks associated to violation of moral norms, such as scenarios and sentences of moral depravity ratings. Using quantitative meta-analyses, we report common and distinct brain areas that show concordance as a function of category. Specifically, concordance in ventromedial prefrontal regions is distinct to social norm representation processing, whereas concordance in right insula, dorsolateral prefrontal, and dorsal cingulate cortices is distinct to norm violation processing. We propose a neurocognitive model of social norms for healthy adults, which could help guide future research in social norm compliance and mechanisms of its enforcement.