Conditioned social dominance threat: observation of others' social dominance biases threat learning

Fear in action: Fear conditioning and alleviation through body movements

Fear memories enhance survival especially when the memories guide defensive movements to minimize harm. Accordingly, fear memories and body movements have tight relationships in animals: Fear memory acquisition results in adapting reactive defense movements, while training active defense movements reduces fear memory. However, evidence in humans is scarce because their movements are typically suppressed in experiments. Here, we tracked adult participants' body motions while they underwent ecologically valid fear conditioning in a 3D virtual space. First, with body motion tracking, we revealed that distinct spatiotemporal body movement patterns emerge through fear conditioning. Second, subsequent training to actively avoid threats with naturalistic defensive actions led to a long-term (24 h) reduction of physiological and embodied conditioned responses, while extinction or vicarious training only transiently reduced the responses. Together, our results highlight the role of body movements in human fear memory and its intervention.

A Brain-To-Brain Mechanism for Social Transmission of Threat Learning

Survival and adaptation in environments require swift and efficacious learning about what is dangerous. Across species, much of such threat learning is acquired socially, e.g., through the observation of others' ("demonstrators'") defensive behaviors. However, the specific neural mechanisms responsible for the integration of information shared between demonstrators and observers remain largely unknown. This dearth of knowledge is addressed by performing magnetoencephalography (MEG) neuroimaging in demonstrator-observer dyads. A set of stimuli are first shown to a demonstrator whose defensive responses are filmed and later presented to an observer, while neuronal activity is recorded sequentially from both individuals who never interacted directly. These results show that brain-to-brain coupling (BtBC) in the fronto-limbic circuit (including insula, ventromedial, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) within demonstrator-observer dyads predict subsequent expressions of learning in the observer. Importantly, the predictive power of BtBC magnifies when a threat is imminent to the demonstrator. Furthermore, BtBC depends on how observers perceive their social status relative to the demonstrator, likely driven by shared attention and emotion, as bolstered by dyadic pupillary coupling. Taken together, this study describes a brain-to-brain mechanism for social threat learning, involving BtBC, which reflects social relationships and predicts adaptive, learned behaviors.

Experience of a hierarchical relationship between a pair of mice specifically influences their affective empathy toward each other

Prior experience of social hierarchy is known to modulate emotional contagion, a basic form of affective empathy. However, it is not known whether this behavioral effect occurs through changes in an individual's traits due to their experience of social hierarchy or specific social interrelationships between the individuals. Groups of four mice with an established in-group hierarchy were used to address this in conjunction with a tube test. The rank-1 and rank-4 mice were designated as the dominant or subordinate groups, respectively. The two individuals in between were designated as the intermediate groups, which were then used as the observers in observational fear learning (OFL) experiments, an assay for emotional contagion. The intermediate observers showed greater OFL responses to the dominant demonstrator than the subordinate demonstrators recruited from the same home-cage. When the demonstrators were strangers from different cages, the intermediate observers did not distinguish between dominant and subordinate, displaying the same level of OFL. In a reverse setting in which the intermediate group was used as the demonstrator, the subordinate observers showed higher OFL responses than the dominant observers, and this occurred only when the demonstrators were cagemates of the observers. Furthermore, the bigger the rank difference between a pair, the higher the OFL level that the observer displayed. Altogether, these results demonstrate that the hierarchical interrelationship established between a given pair of animals is critical for expressing emotional contagion between them rather than any potential changes in intrinsic traits due to the experience of dominant/subordinate hierarchy. PRACTITIONER POINTS: Subordinate observer or dominant demonstrator resulted in higher affective empathic response in familiar pairs but not unfamiliar pairs. The relative social rank of the observer with respect to the demonstrator had a negative linear correlation with the affective empathic response of the observer in familiar pairs but not unfamiliar pairs. The effect of social rank on affective empathy is attributed to the prior social hierarchical interrelationship between them and is not due to intrinsic attributes of an individual based on one's dominance rank.

The neural signatures of social hierarchy-related learning and interaction: A coordinate- and connectivity-based meta-analysis

Numerous neuroimaging studies have investigated the neural mechanisms of two mutually independent yet closely related cognitive processes aiding humans to navigate complex societies: social hierarchy-related learning (SH-RL) and social hierarchy-related interaction (SH-RI). To integrate these heterogeneous results into a more fine-grained and reliable characterization of the neural basis of social hierarchy, we combined coordinate-based meta-analyses with connectivity and functional decoding analyses to understand the underlying neuropsychological mechanism of SH-RL and SH-RI. We identified the anterior insula and temporoparietal junction (dominance detection), medial prefrontal cortex (information updating and computation), and intraparietal sulcus region, amygdala, and hippocampus (social hierarchy representation) as consistent activated brain regions for SH-RL, but the striatum, amygdala, and hippocampus associated with reward processing for SH-RI. Our results provide an overview of the neural architecture of the neuropsychological processes underlying how we understand, and interact within, social hierarchy.

Seven computations of the social brain

The social environment presents the human brain with the most complex information processing demands. The computations that the brain must perform occur in parallel, combine social and nonsocial cues, produce verbal and nonverbal signals and involve multiple cognitive systems, including memory, attention, emotion and learning. This occurs dynamically and at timescales ranging from milliseconds to years. Here, we propose that during social interactions, seven core operations interact to underwrite coherent social functioning; these operations accumulate evidence efficiently-from multiple modalities-when inferring what to do next. We deconstruct the social brain and outline the key components entailed for successful human-social interaction. These include (i) social perception; (ii) social inferences, such as mentalizing; (iii) social learning; (iv) social signaling through verbal and nonverbal cues; (v) social drives (e.g. how to increase one's status); (vi) determining the social identity of agents, including oneself and (vii) minimizing uncertainty within the current social context by integrating sensory signals and inferences. We argue that while it is important to examine these distinct aspects of social inference, to understand the true nature of the human social brain, we must also explain how the brain integrates information from the social world.

Observation of others' threat reactions recovers memories previously shaped by firsthand experiences

Information about dangers can spread effectively by observation of others' threat responses. Yet, it is unclear if such observational threat information interacts with associative memories that are shaped by the individual's direct, firsthand experiences. Here, we show in humans and rats that the mere observation of a conspecific's threat reactions reinstates previously learned and extinguished threat responses in the observer. In two experiments, human participants displayed elevated physiological responses to threat-conditioned cues after observational reinstatement in a context-specific manner. The elevation of physiological responses (arousal) was further specific to the context that was observed as dangerous. An analogous experiment in rats provided converging results by demonstrating reinstatement of defensive behavior after observing another rat's threat reactions. Taken together, our findings provide cross-species evidence that observation of others' threat reactions can recover associations previously shaped by direct, firsthand aversive experiences. Our study offers a perspective on how retrieval of threat memories draws from associative mechanisms that might underlie both observations of others' and firsthand experiences.

The face value of feedback: facial behaviour is shaped by goals and punishments during interaction with dynamic faces

Responding appropriately to others' facial expressions is key to successful social functioning. Despite the large body of work on face perception and spontaneous responses to static faces, little is known about responses to faces in dynamic, naturalistic situations, and no study has investigated how goal directed responses to faces are influenced by learning during dyadic interactions. To experimentally model such situations, we developed a novel method based on online integration of electromyography signals from the participants' face (corrugator supercilii and zygomaticus major) during facial expression exchange with dynamic faces displaying happy and angry facial expressions. Fifty-eight participants learned by trial-and-error to avoid receiving aversive stimulation by either reciprocate (congruently) or respond opposite (incongruently) to the expression of the target face. Our results validated our method, showing that participants learned to optimize their facial behaviour, and replicated earlier findings of faster and more accurate responses in congruent versus incongruent conditions. Moreover, participants performed better on trials when confronted with smiling, when compared with frowning, faces, suggesting it might be easier to adapt facial responses to positively associated expressions. Finally, we applied drift diffusion and reinforcement learning models to provide a mechanistic explanation for our findings which helped clarifying the underlying decision-making processes of our experimental manipulation. Our results introduce a new method to study learning and decision-making in facial expression exchange, in which there is a need to gradually adapt facial expression selection to both social and non-social reinforcements.

Regional and network neural activity reflect men's preference for greater socioeconomic status during impression formation

Evidence from social psychology suggests that men compared to women more readily display and pursue control over human resources or capital. However, studying how status and gender shape deliberate impression formation is difficult due to social desirability concerns. Using univariate and multivariate fMRI analyses (n = 65), we examined how gender and socioeconomic status (SES) may influence brain responses during deliberate but private impression formation. Men more than women showed greater activity in the VMPFC and NAcc when forming impressions of high-SES (vs. low-SES) targets. Seed partial least squares (PLS) analysis showed that this SES-based increase in VMPFC activity was associated with greater co-activation across an evaluative network for the high-SES versus low-SES univariate comparison. A data-driven task PLS analysis also showed greater co-activation in an extended network consisting of regions involved in salience detection, attention, and task engagement as a function of increasing target SES. This co-activating network was most pronounced for men. These findings provide evidence that high-SES targets elicit neural responses indicative of positivity, reward, and salience during impression formation among men. Contributions to a network neuroscience understanding of status perception and implications for gender- and status-based impression formation are discussed.

Do Competitive Contexts Affect Mindreading Performance?

Mindreading is contingent upon interpersonal context. Little is known about how competitive contexts influence mindreading skills. The idea was that the capacity to think about mental states would decline when individuals experiencing failure in competition. This study aims to assess effects of a competitive experience (a computer competitive PC game) on a sample of healthy subjects (119 participants). The sample was divided into two sub-samples. The experimental group underwent an experience of failure, consisting in a PC game of logic against a hypothetical opponent. The control group was required instead only to discuss past personal experiences of competitive interactions. The Metacognitive Assessment Interview was administered to each sub-sample for evaluating mindreading capacities. Self-report tests were additionally provided for evaluation of trait-based dispositions: self-esteem, perfectionism, narcissism. Results supported our hypothesis: induction of sense of failure compromises ability to describe one’s own mental states and mental states of others. This effect was more pronounced in the domain of self-reflection. Results remained significant after controlling for self-esteem, perfectionism, and narcissism. We discuss possible clinical implications of these findings and the importance of evaluating mindreading capacities under the pressure of social rank as well as of other social motive.

How Social Status Shapes Person Perception and Evaluation: A Social Neuroscience Perspective

Inferring the relative rank (i.e., status) of others is essential to navigating social hierarchies. A survey of the expanding social psychological and neuroscience literatures on status reveals a diversity of focuses (e.g., perceiver vs. agent), operationalizations (e.g., status as dominance vs. wealth), and methodologies (e.g., behavioral, neuroscientific). Accommodating this burgeoning literature on status in person perception, the present review offers a novel social neuroscientific framework that integrates existing work with theoretical clarity. This framework distinguishes between five key concepts: (1) strategic pathways to status acquisition for agents, (2) status antecedents (i.e., perceptual and knowledge-based cues that confer status rank), (3) status dimensions (i.e., domains in which an individual may be ranked, such as wealth), (4) status level (i.e., one's rank along a given dimension), and (5) the relative importance of a given status dimension, dependent on perceiver and context characteristics. Against the backdrop of this framework, we review multiple dimensions of status in the nonhuman and human primate literatures. We then review the behavioral and neuroscientific literatures on the consequences of perceived status for attention and evaluation. Finally, after proposing a social neuroscience framework, we highlight innovative directions for future social status research in social psychology and neuroscience.

Social Fear Learning: from Animal Models to Human Function

Learning about potential threats is critical for survival. Learned fear responses are acquired either through direct experiences or indirectly through social transmission. Social fear learning (SFL), also known as vicarious fear learning, is a paradigm successfully used for studying the transmission of threat information between individuals. Animal and human studies have begun to elucidate the behavioral, neural and molecular mechanisms of SFL. Recent research suggests that social learning mechanisms underlie a wide range of adaptive and maladaptive phenomena, from supporting flexible avoidance in dynamic environments to intergenerational transmission of trauma and anxiety disorders. This review discusses recent advances in SFL studies and their implications for basic, social and clinical sciences.