The Role of Perceived Negative Partner Behavior in Daily Snacking Behavior: A Dynamical Systems Approach

Past work suggested that psychological stress, especially in the context of relationship stress, is associated with increased consumption of energy-dense food and when maintained for long periods of time, leads to adverse health consequences. Furthermore, this association is moderated by a variety of factors, including emotional over-eating style. That being said, few work utilized a dynamical system approach to understand the intraindividual and interindividual fluctuations within this process. The current study utilized a 14-day daily diary study, collected between January-March 2020, where participants reported their partner's negative relationship behavior and their own snacking behavior. A differential equation model was applied to the daily dairy data collected. Results showed that snacking behavior followed an undamped oscillator model while negative relationship behavior followed a damped coupled oscillator model. In other words, snacking behavior fluctuated around an equilibrium but was not coupled within dyadic partners. Negative relationship behavior fluctuated around an equilibrium and was amplified over time, coupled within dyadic partners. Furthermore, we found a two-fold association between negative relationship behavior and snacking: while the association between the displacement of negative relationship behavior and snacking was negative, change in negative relationship behavior and snacking were aligned. Thus, at any given time, one's snacking depends both on the amount of negative relationship behaviors one perceives and the dynamical state a dyad is engaging in (i.e., whether the negative relationship behavior is "exacerbating" or "resolving"). This former association was moderated by emotional over-eating style and the latter association was not. The current findings highlight the importance of examining dynamics within dyadic system and offers empirical and methodological insights for research in adult relationships.

Social Regulation of the Neural Threat Response Predicts Subsequent Markers of Physical Health

OBJECTIVE

Social support has been linked to a vast range of beneficial health outcomes. However, the physiological mechanisms of social support are not well characterized. Drawing on functional magnetic resonance imaging and health-related outcome data, this study aimed to understand how neural measures of "yielding"-the reduction of brain activity during social support-moderate the link between social support and health.

METHODS

We used a data set where 78 participants around the age of 24 years were exposed to the threat of shock when holding the hand of a partner. At ages 28 to 30 years, participants returned for a health visit where inflammatory activity and heart rate variability were recorded.

RESULTS

Findings showed a significant interaction between dorsal anterior cingulate cortex-related yielding and perceived social support on C-reactive protein levels ( β = -0.95, SE = 0.42, z = -2.24, p = .025, 95% confidence interval = -1.77 to -0.12). We also found a significant interaction between hypothalamus-related yielding and perceived social support on baseline heart rate variability ( β = 0.51, SE = 0.23, z = 2.19, p = .028, 95% confidence interval = 0.05 to 0.97).

CONCLUSIONS

Greater perceived social support was associated with lower C-reactive protein levels and greater baseline heart rate variability among individuals who were more likely to yield to social support in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and hypothalamus years earlier. The current study highlights the construct of yielding in the link between social support and physical health.

Beyond Nature Versus Nurture: the Emergence of Emotion

Affective science is stuck in a version of the nature-versus-nurture debate, with theorists arguing whether emotions are evolved adaptations or psychological constructions. We do not see these as mutually exclusive options. Many adaptive behaviors that humans have evolved to be good at, such as walking, emerge during development - not according to a genetically dictated program, but through interactions between the affordances of the body, brain, and environment. We suggest emotions are the same. As developing humans acquire increasingly complex goals and learn optimal strategies for pursuing those goals, they are inevitably pulled to particular brain-body-behavior states that maximize outcomes and self-reinforce via positive feedback loops. We call these recurring, self-organized states emotions. Emotions display many of the hallmark features of self-organized attractor states, such as hysteresis (prior events influence the current state), degeneracy (many configurations of the underlying variables can produce the same global state), and stability. Because most bodily, neural, and environmental affordances are shared by all humans - we all have cardiovascular systems, cerebral cortices, and caregivers who raised us - similar emotion states emerge in all of us. This perspective helps reconcile ideas that, at first glance, seem contradictory, such as emotion universality and neural degeneracy.

Mechanisms supporting the social regulation of neural threat responding with marital partners: A test of the opioid hypothesis

Positive social contact predicts better health, but the mechanisms for this association remain debated. One way to explore this link is through the social regulation of emotion, particularly anticipatory anxiety. Previous research finds less neural threat response during partner handholding than when people are alone or stranger handholding. Various mechanistic accounts have been forwarded, including the hypothesis that this effect is mediated by endogenous opioid activity. This experiment critically tested the opioid hypothesis in 60 married participants and their partners. The study used a naltrexone opioid blockade in a double-blind placebo control with functional magnetic resonance imaging to determine whether endogenous opioids were necessary for handholding effects. Regulatory effects of supportive handholding manifested in threat network regions during opioid blockade, but not with placebo. Despite a surprising lack of effect in the placebo group, the overall study findings provide initial evidence that endogenous opioids may not be necessary for the social regulation of neural threat responding.

The social regulation of emotion: Inconsistencies suggest no mediation through ventromedial prefrontal cortex

Physical touch in the form of holding a loved one's hand attenuates the neural response to threat. Speculation regarding the neural mediation of this effect points to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), which is known to have inhibitory connections with threat responsive brain regions such as the amygdala. Despite the attractiveness of this hypothesis, a link between the vmPFC and diminished threat during handholding has been difficult to demonstrate empirically. Here we report that in a sample of 110 participants no evidence for vmPFC mediation of the handholding effect was obtained. Indeed, results indicated that connectivity patterns between threat responsive salience network structures and the vmPFC were in the opposite direction one would predict if the vmPFC mediated reductions in neural threat-responding caused by partner handholding. Our findings suggest that the vmPFC does not mediate the regulating effect of physical contact on neural threat responses.

Yielding to social presence as a bioenergetic strategy

All life must strategically conserve and allocate resources in order to meet the challenges of living. Social Baseline Theory suggests that, for humans, social context and the social resources therein are a central ecology in human phylogeny. In ontogeny, this manifests in flexible bioenergetic strategies that vary in the population based on social history. We introduce yielding, a conservation process wherein we relax physiological investment in response to a challenge when in the presence of a relational partner. The availability of these conserved resources then impact response to subsequent challenges while alone and if this pattern is habitual, it can reciprocally influence strategies used to solve or cope with typical stress. We discuss neural targets of this resource conservation and reframe our lab's previous studies on the social regulation of neural threat responding within this framework. We then show functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data indicating the presence of relational partners decreases blood-oxygen-level-dependent (BOLD) response to threat in key targets of resource conservation (e.g, dlPFC, dACC, and insula) and that stronger signal reduction in these areas coincide with less BOLD in pre-frontal (vmPFC, dlPFC) and visuo-sensory integration (occipital cortex, precuneus, superior parietal lobule) regions during ostracism. Finally, we show that these neural relationships are associated with less use of self-regulation-based coping strategies two years post scanning. Taken together, we show the utility of yielding both as a concept and as a bioenergetic process which helps to conserve energy in this social primate.

OXTR DNA methylation moderates the developmental calibration of neural reward sensitivity

The Adaptive Calibration Model of Stress Responsivity (ACM) suggests that developmental experiences predictably tune biological systems to meet the demands of the environment. Particularly important is the calibration of reward systems. Using a longitudinal sample (N = 184) followed since adolescence, this study models the dimensions of early life stress and their effects on epigenetic modification of the oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR) and individual differences in neural response to reward anticipation. We first created a latent variable model of developmental context using measures collected when participants were 13 years old. As adults, two subsets of participants completed a reward anticipation fMRI paradigm (N = 82) and agreed to have their blood assayed for (OXTR) DNA methylation (N = 112) at two CpG sites. Three latent constructs of developmental context emerged: Neighborhood Harshness, Family Harshness, and Abuse and Disorder. Greater OXTR DNA methylation at CpG sites -924 and -934 blunted the association between greater Neighborhood Harshness and increased neural activation in caudate in anticipation of rewards. Interaction effects were also found outside of reward-related areas for all three latent constructs. Results indicate an epigenetically derived differential susceptibility model whereby high methylation coincides with decreased association between developmental environment and neural reward anticipation.

Social Allostasis and Social Allostatic Load: A New Model for Research in Social Dynamics, Stress, and Health

Theories such as social baseline theory have argued that social groups serve a regulatory function but have not explored whether this regulatory process carries costs for the group. Allostatic load, the wear and tear on regulatory systems caused by chronic or frequent stress, is marked by diminished stress system flexibility and compromised recovery. We argue that allostatic load may develop within social groups as well and provide a model for how relationship dysfunction operates. Social allostatic load may be characterized by processes such as groups becoming locked into static patterns of interaction and may ultimately lead to up-regulation or down-regulation of a group's set point, or the optimal range of arousal or affect around which the group tends to converge. Many studies of emotional and physiological linkage within groups have reported that highly correlated states of arousal, which may reflect failure to maintain a group-level regulatory baseline, occur in the context of stress, conflict, and relationship distress. Relationship strain may also place greater demands on neurocognitive regulatory processes. Just as allostatic load may be detrimental to individual health, social allostatic load may corrode relationship quality.

Subjective General Health and the Social Regulation of Hypothalamic Activity

OBJECTIVE

Social support is associated with better health. This association may be partly mediated through the social regulation of adrenomedullary activity related to poor cardiovascular health and glucocorticoid activity known to inhibit immune functioning. These physiological cascades originate in the hypothalamic areas that are involved in the neural response to threat. The aim of the study investigated whether the down regulation, by social support, of hypothalamic responses to threat is associated with better subjective health.

METHODS

A diverse community sample of seventy-five individuals, aged 23 to 26 years, were recruited from an ongoing longitudinal study. Participants completed the Short Form Health Survey, a well-validated self-report measure used to assess subjective general health. They were scanned, using functional magnetic resonance imaging, during a threat of shock paradigm involving various levels of social support, which was manipulated using handholding from a close relational partner, a stranger, and an alone condition. We focused on a hypothalamic region of interest derived from an independent sample to examine the association between hypothalamic activity and subjective general health.

RESULTS

Results revealed a significant interaction between handholding condition and self-reported general health (F(2,72) = 3.53, p = .032, partial η = 0.05). Down regulation of the hypothalamic region of interest during partner handholding corresponded with higher self-ratings of general health (ß = -0.31, p = .007).

CONCLUSIONS

Higher self-ratings of general health correspond with decreased hypothalamic activity during a task that blends threat with supportive handholding. These results suggest that associations between social support and health are partly mediated through the social regulation of hypothalamic sensitivity to threat.

Relationships and Health: The Critical Role of Affective Science

High-quality social relationships predict a range of positive health outcomes, but no broadly accepted theory can explain the mechanisms of action in this area. The central argument of this article is that affective science can provide keys for integrating the diverse array of theoretical models concerning relationships and health. From nine prominent theories, we cull four components of relational affect that link social resources to health-related outcomes. This component model holds promise for integrating research from the different theoretical perspectives and for generating new, mechanistic questions about the connection between relationships and health. The article closes by outlining three empirical study ideas that illustrate ways in which the different components can be studied together in the context of mechanism-focused research.

New Ways to Explore the Relationship–Emotion–Health Connection

The commentaries by Rimé (2018) and Scherer (2018) underscore and extend many of the central themes discussed in our target article (Sbarra & Coan, 2018). This response filters the commentaries through the lens of our review article and highlights the core idea that relationships provide a vital context for the types of emotional responding outlined in the commentaries, including the social sharing of emotion (an inherently interpersonal process) as well as the link between emotional competence and physical health (which can unfold both within and between people).

Relationship status and perceived support in the social regulation of neural responses to threat

Strong social ties correspond with better health and well being, but the neural mechanisms linking social contact to health remain speculative. This study extends work on the social regulation of brain activity by supportive handholding in 110 participants (51 female) of diverse racial and socioeconomic origins. In addition to main effects of social regulation by handholding, we assessed the moderating effects of both perceived social support and relationship status (married, cohabiting, dating or platonic friends). Results suggest that, under threat of shock, handholding by familiar relational partners attenuates both subjective distress and activity in a network associated with salience, vigilance and regulatory self-control. Moreover, greater perceived social support corresponded with less brain activity in an extended network associated with similar processes, but only during partner handholding. In contrast, we did not observe any regulatory effects of handholding by strangers, and relationship status did not moderate the regulatory effects of partner handholding. These findings suggest that contact with a familiar relational partner is likely to attenuate subjective distress and a variety of neural responses associated with the presence of threat. This effect is likely enhanced by an individual's expectation of the availability of support from their wider social network.

Lower neighborhood quality in adolescence predicts higher mesolimbic sensitivity to reward anticipation in adulthood

Life history theory suggests that adult reward sensitivity should be best explained by childhood, but not current, socioeconomic conditions. In this functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study, 83 participants from a larger longitudinal sample completed the monetary incentive delay (MID) task in adulthood (∼25 years old). Parent-reports of neighborhood quality and parental SES were collected when participants were 13 years of age. Current income level was collected concurrently with scanning. Lower adolescent neighborhood quality, but neither lower current income nor parental SES, was associated with heightened sensitivity to the anticipation of monetary gain in putative mesolimbic reward areas. Lower adolescent neighborhood quality was also associated with heightened sensitivity to the anticipation of monetary loss activation in visuo-motor areas. Lower current income was associated with heightened sensitivity to anticipated loss in occipital areas and the operculum. We tested whether externalizing behaviors in childhood or adulthood could better account for neighborhood quality findings, but they did not. Findings suggest that neighborhood ecology in adolescence is associated with greater neural reward sensitivity in adulthood above the influence of parental SES or current income and not mediated through impulsivity and externalizing behaviors.

Maintaining warm, trusting relationships with brands: increased temperature perceptions after thinking of communal brands

Classical theories on interpersonal relations have long suggested that social interactions are influenced by sensation, such as the experience of warmth. Past empirical work now confirms that perceived differences in temperature impact how people form thoughts about relationships. The present work first integrates our knowledge database on brand research with this idea of "grounded social cognition". It then leverages a large sample (total N = 2,552) toward elucidating links between estimates of temperature and positive versus negative evaluations of communal brands. In five studies, the authors have found that thinking about positively (vs. negatively) perceived communal brands leads to heightened temperature estimates. A meta-analysis of the five studies shows a small but consistent effect in this noisy environment, r = .11, 95% CI, .05, .18. Exploratory analyses in Studies 1a and b further suggest that temperature perceptions mediate the (significant) relationship between perceived communality and willingness to purchase from the brand. The authors discuss implications for theory and practice and consider the effects from a Social Baseline Perspective.

Sugarcoated isolation: evidence that social avoidance is linked to higher basal glucose levels and higher consumption of glucose

Objective: The human brain adjusts its level of effort in coping with various life stressors as a partial function of perceived access to social resources. We examined whether people who avoid social ties maintain a higher fasting basal level of glucose in their bloodstream and consume more sugar-rich food, reflecting strategies to draw more on personal resources when threatened. Methods: In Study 1 (N = 60), we obtained fasting blood glucose and adult attachment orientations data. In Study 2 (N = 285), we collected measures of fasting blood glucose and adult attachment orientations from older adults of mixed gender, using a measure of attachment style different from Study 1. In Study 3 (N = 108), we examined the link between trait-like attachment avoidance, manipulation of an asocial state, and consumption of sugar-rich food. In Study 4 (N = 115), we examined whether manipulating the social network will moderate the effect of attachment avoidance on consumption of sugar-rich food. Results: In Study 1, fasting blood glucose levels corresponded with higher attachment avoidance scores after statistically adjusting for time of assessment and interpersonal anxiety. For Study 2, fasting blood glucose continued to correspond with higher adult attachment avoidance even after statistically adjusting for interpersonal anxiety, stress indices, age, gender, social support and body mass. In Study 3, people high in attachment avoidance consume more sugar-rich food, especially when reminded of asocial tendencies. Study 4 indicated that after facing a stressful task in the presence of others, avoidant people gather more sugar-rich food than more socially oriented people. Conclusion: Results are consistent with the suggestion that socially avoidant individuals upwardly adjust their basal glucose levels and consume more glucose-rich food with the expectation of increased personal effort because of limited access to social resources. Further investigation of this link is warranted.

A theory of social thermoregulation in human primates

Beyond breathing, the regulation of body temperature-thermoregulation-is one of the most pressing concerns for many animals. A dysregulated body temperature has dire consequences for survival and development. Despite the high frequency of social thermoregulation occurring across many species, little is known about the role of social thermoregulation in human (social) psychological functioning. We outline a theory of social thermoregulation and reconsider earlier research on people's expectations of their social world (i.e., attachment) and their prediction of the social world. We provide support and outline a research agenda that includes consequences for individual variation in self-regulatory strategies and capabilities. In our paper, we discuss physiological, neural, and social processes surrounding thermoregulation. Emphasizing social thermoregulation in particular, we appeal to the economy of action principle and the hierarchical organization of human thermoregulatory systems. We close with future directions of a crucial aspect of human functioning: the social regulation of body temperature.

Social Baseline Theory: The Social Regulation of Risk and Effort

We describe Social Baseline Theory (SBT), a perspective that integrates the study of social relationships with principles of attachment, behavioral ecology, cognitive neuroscience, and perception science. SBT suggests the human brain expects access to social relationships that mitigate risk and diminish the level of effort needed to meet a variety of goals. This is accomplished in part by incorporating relational partners into neural representations of the self. By contrast, decreased access to relational partners increases cognitive and physiological effort. Relationship disruptions entail re-defining the self as independent, which implies greater risk, increased effort, and diminished well being. The ungrafting of the self and other may mediate recovery from relationship loss.

Adolescent neighborhood quality predicts adult dACC response to social exclusion

Neuroimaging studies using the social-exclusion paradigm Cyberball indicate increased dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and right insula activity as a function of exclusion. However, comparatively less work has been done on how social status factors may moderate this finding. This study used the Cyberball paradigm with 85 (45 females) socio-economically diverse participants from a larger longitudinal sample. We tested whether neighborhood quality during adolescence would predict subsequent neural responding to social exclusion in young adulthood. Given previous behavioral studies indicating greater social vigilance and negative evaluation as a function of lower status, we expected that lower adolescent neighborhood quality would predict greater dACC activity during exclusion at young adulthood. Our findings indicate that young adults who lived in low-quality neighborhoods in adolescence showed greater dACC activity to social exclusion than those who lived in higher quality neighborhoods. Lower neighborhood quality also predicted greater prefrontal activation in the superior frontal gyrus, dorsal medial prefrontal cortex and the middle frontal gyrus, possibly indicating greater regulatory effort. Finally, this effect was not driven by subsequent ratings of distress during exclusion. In sum, adolescent neighborhood quality appears to potentiate neural responses to social exclusion in young adulthood, effects that are independent of felt distress.

A semi-parametric nonlinear model for event-related fMRI

Nonlinearity in evoked hemodynamic responses often presents in event-related fMRI studies. Volterra series, a higher-order extension of linear convolution, has been used in the literature to construct a nonlinear characterization of hemodynamic responses. Estimation of the Volterra kernel coefficients in these models is usually challenging due to the large number of parameters. We propose a new semi-parametric model based on Volterra series for the hemodynamic responses that greatly reduces the number of parameters and enables "information borrowing" among subjects. This model assumes that in the same brain region and under the same stimulus, the hemodynamic responses across subjects share a common but unknown functional shape that can differ in magnitude, latency and degree of interaction. We develop a computationally-efficient strategy based on splines to estimate the model parameters, and a hypothesis test on nonlinearity. The proposed method is compared with several existing methods via extensive simulations, and is applied to a real event-related fMRI study.

Increased default mode network activity in socially anxious individuals during reward processing

Background

Social anxiety has been associated with potentiated negative affect and, more recently, with diminished positive affect. It is unclear how these alterations in negative and positive affect are represented neurally in socially anxious individuals and, further, whether they generalize to non-social stimuli. To explore this, we used a monetary incentive paradigm to explore the association between social anxiety and both the anticipation and consumption of non-social incentives. Eighty-four individuals from a longitudinal community sample underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) while participating in a monetary incentive delay (MID) task. The MID task consisted of alternating cues indicating the potential to win or prevent losing varying amounts of money based on the speed of the participant’s response. We examined whether self-reported levels of social anxiety, averaged across approximately 7 years of data, moderated brain activity when contrasting gain or loss cues with neutral cues during the anticipation and outcome phases of incentive processing. Whole brain analyses and analyses restricted to the ventral striatum for the anticipation phase and the medial prefrontal cortex for the outcome phase were conducted.

Results

Social anxiety did not associate with differences in hit rates or reaction times when responding to cues. Further, socially anxious individuals did not exhibit decreased ventral striatum activity during anticipation of gains or decreased MPFC activity during the outcome of gain trials, contrary to expectations based on literature indicating blunted positive affect in social anxiety. Instead, social anxiety showed positive associations with extensive regions implicated in default mode network activity (for example, precuneus, posterior cingulate cortex, and parietal lobe) during anticipation and receipt of monetary gain. Social anxiety was further linked with decreased activity in the ventral striatum during anticipation of monetary loss.

Conclusions

Socially anxious individuals may increase default mode network activity during reward processing, suggesting high self-focused attention even in relation to potentially rewarding stimuli lacking explicit social connotations. Additionally, social anxiety may relate to decreased ventral striatum reactivity when anticipating potential losses.

Resting and task-elicited prefrontal EEG alpha asymmetry in depression: support for the capability model

The capability model of frontal electroencephalographic (EEG) asymmetry suggests that brain activity during emotional challenge will be a more powerful indicator of predispositions toward psychopathology than activity observed at rest. EEG data were assessed during a resting baseline and a facial emotion task, wherein individuals with (n = 143) and without (n = 163) lifetime major depressive disorder (MDD) made approach (angry and happy) and withdrawal (afraid and sad) facial expressions. EEG asymmetry during emotional challenge was a more powerful indicator of MDD status than resting asymmetry for average, Cz, and linked mastoid references, results in support of the capability model. However, current-source-density (CSD) transformed asymmetry was indicative of lifetime MDD status under resting and task-elicited conditions. Findings suggest that CSD-transformed data may be more robust indicators of trait frontal EEG asymmetry.

Brain, body, and cognition: neural, physiological and self-report correlates of phobic and normative fear

The phobic fear response appears to resemble an intense form of normal threat responding that can be induced in a nonthreatening situation. However, normative and phobic fear are rarely contrasted directly, thus the degree to which these two types of fear elicit similar neural and bodily responses is not well understood. To examine biological correlates of normal and phobic fear, 21 snake phobic and 21 nonphobic controls saw videos of slithering snakes, attacking snakes and fish in an event-related fMRI design. Simultaneous eletrodermal, pupillary, and self-reported affective responses were collected. Nonphobic fear activated a network of threat-responsive brain regions and involved pupillary dilation, electrodermal response and self-reported affect selective to the attacking snakes. Phobic fear recruited a large array of brain regions including those active in normal fear plus additional structures and also engendered increased pupil dilation, electrodermal and self-reported responses that were greater to any snake versus fish. Importantly, phobics showed greater between- and within-subject concordance among neural, electrodermal, pupillary, and subjective report measures. These results suggest phobic responses recruit overlapping but more strongly activated and more extensive networks of brain activity as compared to normative fear, and are characterized by greater concordance among neural activation, peripheral physiology and self-report. It is yet unclear whether concordance is unique to psychopathology, or rather simply an indicator of the intense fear seen in the phobic response, but these results underscore the importance of synchrony between brain, body, and cognition during the phobic reaction.

Soothing the threatened brain: leveraging contact comfort with emotionally focused therapy

Social relationships are tightly linked to health and well-being. Recent work suggests that social relationships can even serve vital emotion regulation functions by minimizing threat-related neural activity. But relationship distress remains a significant public health problem in North America and elsewhere. A promising approach to helping couples both resolve relationship distress and nurture effective interpersonal functioning is Emotionally Focused Therapy for couples (EFT), a manualized, empirically supported therapy that is strongly focused on repairing adult attachment bonds. We sought to examine a neural index of social emotion regulation as a potential mediator of the effects of EFT. Specifically, we examined the effectiveness of EFT for modifying the social regulation of neural threat responding using an fMRI-based handholding procedure. Results suggest that EFT altered the brain's representation of threat cues in the presence of a romantic partner. EFT-related changes during stranger handholding were also observed, but stranger effects were dependent upon self-reported relationship quality. EFT also appeared to increase threat-related brain activity in regions associated with self-regulation during the no-handholding condition. These findings provide a critical window into the regulatory mechanisms of close relationships in general and EFT in particular.

The social regulation of threat-related attentional disengagement in highly anxious individuals

Social support may normalize stress reactivity among highly anxious individuals, yet little research has examined anxious reactions in social contexts. We examined the role of both state and trait anxiety in the link between social support and the neural response to threat. We employed an fMRI paradigm in which participants faced the threat of electric shock under three conditions: alone, holding a stranger's hand, and holding a friend's hand. We found significant interactions between trait anxiety and threat condition in regions including the hypothalamus, putamen, precentral gyrus, and precuneus. Analyses revealed that highly trait anxious individuals were less active in each of these brain regions while alone in the scanner-a pattern that suggests the attentional disengagement associated with the perception of high intensity threats. These findings support past research suggesting that individuals high in anxiety tend to have elevated neural responses to mild or moderate threats but paradoxically lower responses to high intensity threats, suggesting a curvilinear relationship between anxiety and threat responding. We hypothesized that for highly anxious individuals, shock cues would be perceived as highly threatening while alone in the scanner, possibly due to attentional disengagement, but this perception would be mitigated if they were holding someone's hand. The disengagement seen in highly anxious people under conditions of high perceived threat may thus be alleviated by social proximity. These results suggest a role for social support in regulating emotional responses in anxious individuals, which may aid in treatment outcomes.

Familiarity promotes the blurring of self and other in the neural representation of threat

Neurobiological investigations of empathy often support an embodied simulation account. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we monitored statistical associations between brain activations indicating self-focused threat to those indicating threats to a familiar friend or an unfamiliar stranger. Results in regions such as the anterior insula, putamen and supramarginal gyrus indicate that self-focused threat activations are robustly correlated with friend-focused threat activations but not stranger-focused threat activations. These results suggest that one of the defining features of human social bonding may be increasing levels of overlap between neural representations of self and other. This article presents a novel and important methodological approach to fMRI empathy studies, which informs how differences in brain activation can be detected in such studies and how covariate approaches can provide novel and important information regarding the brain and empathy.

Childhood maternal support and social capital moderate the regulatory impact of social relationships in adulthood

For this functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study, we assessed the impact of early social experiences on the social regulation of neural threat responding in a sample of 22 individuals that have been followed for over a decade. At 13 years old, a multidimensional measure of neighborhood quality was derived from parental reports. Three measures of neighborhood quality were used to estimate social capital-the level of trust, reciprocity, cooperation, and shared resources within a community. At 16 years old, an observational measure of maternal emotional support behavior was derived from a mother/child social interaction task. At 24 years old, participants were asked to visit our neuroimaging facility with an opposite-sex platonic friend. During their MRI visit, participants were subjected to the threat of electric shock while holding their friend's hand, the hand of an anonymous opposite-sex experimenter, or no hand at all. Higher adolescent maternal support corresponded with less threat-related activation during friend handholding, but not during the stranger or alone conditions, in the bilateral orbitofrontal cortex, inferior frontal gyrus and left insula. Higher neighborhood social capital corresponded with less threat-related activation during friend hand-holding in the superior frontal gyrus, supplementary motor cortex, insula, putamen and thalamus; but low childhood capital corresponded with less threat-related activation during stranger handholding in the same regions. Exploratory analyses suggest that this latter result is due to the increased threat responsiveness during stranger handholding among low social capital individuals, even during safety cues. Overall, early maternal support behavior and high neighborhood quality may potentiate soothing by relational partners, and low neighborhood quality may decrease the overall regulatory impact of access to social resources in adulthood.

Implicit conditioning of faces via the social regulation of emotion: ERP evidence of early attentional biases for security conditioned faces

Not much is known about the neural and psychological processes that promote the initial conditions necessary for positive social bonding. This study explores one method of conditioned bonding utilizing dynamics related to the social regulation of emotion and attachment theory. This form of conditioning involves repeated presentations of negative stimuli followed by images of warm, smiling faces. L. Beckes, J. Simpson, and A. Erickson (2010) found that this conditioning procedure results in positive associations with the faces measured via a lexical decision task, suggesting they are perceived as comforting. This study found that the P1 ERP was similarly modified by this conditioning procedure and the P1 amplitude predicted lexical decision times to insecure words primed by the faces. The findings have implications for understanding how the brain detects supportive people, the flexibility and modifiability of early ERP components, and social bonding more broadly.

Mutuality and the social regulation of neural threat responding

Recent studies have shown that the presence of a caring relational partner can attenuate neural responses to threat. Here we report reanalyzed data from Coan, Schaefer, and Davidson ( 2006 ), investigating the role of relational mutuality in the neural response to threat. Mutuality reflects the degree to which couple members show mutual interest in the sharing of internal feelings, thoughts, aspirations, and joys - a vital form of responsiveness in attachment relationships. We predicted that wives who were high (versus low) in perceived mutuality, and who attended the study session with their husbands, would show reduced neural threat reactivity in response to mild electric shocks. We also explored whether this effect would depend on physical contact (hand-holding). As predicted, we observed that higher mutuality scores corresponded with decreased neural threat responding in the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and supplementary motor cortex. These effects were independent of hand-holding condition. These findings suggest that higher perceived mutuality corresponds with decreased self-regulatory effort and attenuated preparatory motor activity in response to threat cues, even in the absence of direct physical contact with social resources.

A semi-parametric model of the hemodynamic response for multi-subject fMRI data

A semi-parametric model for estimating hemodynamic response function (HRF) from multi-subject fMRI data is introduced within the context of the General Linear Model. The new model assumes that the HRFs for a fixed brain voxel under a given stimulus share the same unknown functional form across subjects, but differ in height, time to peak, and width. A nonparametric spline-smoothing method is developed to evaluate this common functional form, based on which subject-specific characteristics of the HRFs can be estimated. This semi-parametric model explicitly characterizes the common properties shared across subjects and is flexible in describing various brain hemodynamic activities across different regions and stimuli. In addition, the temporal differentiability of the employed spline basis enables an easy-to-compute way of evaluating latency and width differences in hemodynamic activity. The proposed method is applied to data collected as part of an ongoing study of socially mediated emotion regulation. Comparison with several existing methods is conducted through simulations and real data analysis.

A developmental neuroscience of borderline pathology: emotion dysregulation and social baseline theory

Theoretical and empirical research has linked poor emotion regulation abilities with dysfunctional frontolimbic circuitry. Consistent with this, research on borderline personality disorder (BPD) finds that frontolimbic dysfunction is a predominant neural substrate underlying the disorder. Emotion regulation is profoundly compromised in BPD. However, BPD is also associated with broad impairment across multiple domains, including impulse control, interpersonal relationships, and cognitive functioning. To date, BPD research has focused largely on single areas of dysfunction, failing to account for overlap at either the biological or behavioral levels of analysis. We examine the literature on frontolimbic dysfunction in BPD within the context of Coan's social baseline theory. Social baseline theory proposes that healthy human functioning is dependent upon adequate social support and that, at baseline, biological systems are adapted to operate interdependently rather than independently. The social baseline perspective is particularly useful for understanding borderline personality development because the impulsive and emotionally dysregulated behaviors common among those with BPD occur almost invariably within an interpersonal context. We discuss clinical and research implications of this work.

Cognitive vulnerability and frontal brain asymmetry: common predictors of first prospective depressive episode

The hopelessness theory of depression proposes that individuals with a depressogenic cognitive style are more likely to become hopeless and experience depression following negative life events. Although the neurophysiological underpinnings of cognitive style remain speculative, research indicates that decreased relative left frontal brain electrical activity holds promise as a traitlike marker of depression. This begs the question: Do measures of depressogenic cognitive style and resting frontal brain asymmetry index a common vulnerability? The present study provides preliminary support for this hypothesis. At baseline assessment, increased cognitive vulnerability to depression was associated with decreased relative left frontal brain activity at rest in individuals with no prior history of, or current, depression. Following baseline assessment, participants were followed prospectively an average of 3 years with structured diagnostic interviews at 4-month intervals. Both cognitive vulnerability and asymmetric frontal cortical activity prospectively predicted onset of first depressive episode in separate univariate analyses. Furthermore, multivariate analyses indicated that cognitive vulnerability and frontal asymmetry represented shared, rather than independent, predictors of first depression onset.

Prefrontal asymmetry and parent-rated temperament in infants

Indicators of temperament appear early in infancy and remain relatively stable over time. Despite a great deal of interest in biological indices of temperament, most studies of infant temperament rely on parental reports or behavioral tasks. Thus, the extent to which commonly used temperament measures relate to potential biological indicators of infant temperament is still relatively unknown. The current experiment examines the relationship between a common parental report measure of temperament--the Infant Behavior Questionnaire-Revised (IBQ-R)--and measures of frontal EEG asymmetry in infants. We examined associations between the subscales of the IBQ-R and frontal EEG asymmetry scores recorded during a combined series of neutral attentional and putatively emotional recording conditions in infants between 7 and 9 months of age. We predicted that approach-related subscales of the IBQ-R (e.g., Approach, Soothability) would be related to greater left prefrontal asymmetry, while withdrawal-related subscales (e.g., Distress to Limitations, Fear, Falling Reactivity, Perceptual Sensitivity) would be related to greater right prefrontal asymmetry. In the mid- and lateral-frontal regions, Approach, Distress to Limitations, Fear, Soothability, and Perceptual Sensitivity were generally associated with greater left frontal activation (rs≥.23, ps<0.05), while only Falling Reactivity was associated with greater right frontal activation (rs≤-.44, ps<0.05). Results suggest that variability in frontal EEG asymmetry is robustly associated with parental report measures of temperament in infancy.

The oft-neglected role of parietal EEG asymmetry and risk for major depressive disorder

Relatively less right parietal activity may reflect reduced arousal and signify risk for major depressive disorder (MDD). Inconsistent findings with parietal electroencephalographic (EEG) asymmetry, however, suggest issues such as anxiety comorbidity and sex differences have yet to be resolved. Resting parietal EEG asymmetry was assessed in 306 individuals (31% male) with (n=143) and without (n=163) a DSM-IV diagnosis of lifetime MDD and no comorbid anxiety disorders. Past MDD+ women displayed relatively less right parietal activity than current MDD+ and MDD- women, replicating prior work. Recent caffeine intake, an index of arousal, moderated the relationship between depression and EEG asymmetry for women and men. Findings suggest that sex differences and arousal should be examined in studies of depression and regional brain activity.

Frontal EEG asymmetry during emotional challenge differentiates individuals with and without lifetime major depressive disorder

BACKGROUND

Although it has been argued that frontal electroencephalographic (EEG) asymmetry at rest may be a risk marker for major depressive disorder (MDD), it is unclear whether a pattern of relatively less left than right activity characterizes depressed individuals during emotional challenges. Examination of frontal asymmetry during emotion task manipulations could provide an assessment of the function of systems relevant for MDD, and test the limits of frontal EEG asymmetry as a marker of risk for depression.

METHODS

EEG data were assessed during a facial emotion task, wherein 306 individuals age 18-34 (31% male) with (n=143) and without (n=163) DSM-IV defined lifetime MDD made directed facial actions of approach (angry and happy) and withdrawal (afraid and sad) expressions.

RESULTS

Lifetime depressed individuals displayed less relative left frontal activity than never-depressed individuals during all facial expressions across four EEG reference montages, findings that were not due to emotional experience, facial expression quality, electromyographic (EMG) activity, or current depression status.

LIMITATIONS

Although this was a sizable sample, only one emotion task was utilized.

CONCLUSIONS

Results provide further support for frontal EEG asymmetry as a risk marker for MDD.

Prefrontal brain asymmetry and pre-menstrual dysphoric disorder symptomatology

BACKGROUND

Pre-menstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), a dysphoric form of pre-menstrual syndrome, is included as a diagnosis for further study in the DSM-IV-TR (APA, 2000). The present study investigated whether a marker of risk for major depressive disorder (MDD), prefrontal brain asymmetry, also characterizes women with PMDD.

METHODS

In a sample of 25 college women with PMDD symptomatology and 25 matched controls, resting frontal electroencephalographic (EEG) activity was assessed on four occasions within a two-week span.

RESULTS

Across several frontal sites women with PMDD had relatively less left than right prefrontal brain activity, consistent with a diathesis-stress model for menstrual-related dysphoria.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings suggest an overlap in the risk profile for MDD and PMDD.

Resting frontal EEG asymmetry as an endophenotype for depression risk: sex-specific patterns of frontal brain asymmetry

Resting frontal electroencephalographic (EEG) asymmetry has been hypothesized as a marker of risk for major depressive disorder (MDD), but the extant literature is based predominately on female samples. Resting frontal asymmetry was assessed on 4 occasions within a 2-week period in 306 individuals aged 18-34 (31% male) with (n = 143) and without (n = 163) lifetime MDD as defined by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition (American Psychiatric Association, 1994). Lifetime MDD was linked to relatively less left frontal activity for both sexes using a current source density (CSD) reference, findings that were not accounted for solely by current MDD status or current depression severity, suggesting that CSD-referenced EEG asymmetry is a possible endophenotype for depression. In contrast, results for average and linked mastoid references were less consistent but demonstrated a link between less left frontal activity and current depression severity in women.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Emotion

In this article I respond to commentaries of my review of latent versus emergent variable models of emotion. I note that Ross Buck’s view of emotion as stated in his commentary largely endorses an emergent variable model. Drawing from Dynamical Systems Theory, Camras frames the emergent variable model as softly-assembled attractor states. This implies that emotions are “fuzzy sets” of indicators that vary in the degree to which they indicate an emergent emotional state. Calvo offers affective computing as a method of evaluating indicators according to their incremental contribution to predicting human emotional responses. This innovative perspective holds a great deal of promise. Ultimately, I hope that this discussion has contributed to the field's understanding of emotion and emotional processes.

Cultural Variations in Motivational Responses to Felt Misunderstanding

Three studies examined cultural variations in the motivational consequences of being misunderstood by others. Study 1 found that European American students who felt misunderstood by others performed progressively better academically, whereas Asian and Asian American students who felt misunderstood by others performed progressively worse. In Studies 2 and 3, felt misunderstanding was experimentally manipulated, and motivational responses were measured with a handgrip task (Study 2) and prefrontal electroencephalography (EEG) asymmetry (Study 3). Across the two studies, Asians and Asian Americans showed more withdrawal-related responses but European Americans showed either no difference (Study 2) or more motivated responses (Study 3) after being misunderstood versus being understood. Together, these studies demonstrate systematic cultural variations in motivational responses to felt misunderstanding.

Polymorphisms of the HTR1a allele are linked to frontal brain electrical asymmetry

Polymorphic variations in genes related to serotonin synthesis, transport, recognition, or degradation may convey subtle changes in serotonin system architecture that may place an individual at risk for psychopathology when faced with life stressors. The relationship between three key serotonin alleles and frontal brain electrical asymmetry, a putative endophenotype of depression, was examined. Risk alleles were hypothesized to predict relatively greater right frontal brain activity regardless of current clinical state. A sample of 313 college-age individuals, spanning a range of depressive severity from no symptomotology to clinically meaningful levels, participated. Resting encephalographic (EEG) activity was recorded from 64 scalp sites on four occasions separated by at least 24h (two 8-min recording sessions occurring at each occasion). Alpha power asymmetry scores between homologous sites were calculated for each session and then averaged to form a trait metric of asymmetry for each pair. PCR based genotyping was conducted for the HTR1a, HTR2a, and HTTLPR genes. Variations in the HTR1a gene were related to trait EEG asymmetry, regardless of any history of depression. Compared to subjects with at least one non-risk allele, subjects with homozygous HTR1A risk alleles had significantly greater relative right frontal activity at sites F7/F8, F5/F6, and F1/F2. In conclusion, variation in HTR1a can influence trait level brain activity, which may ultimately be indicative of risk for psychopathology.

Psychosocial Interventions for Bipolar Disorder: Perspective from the Behavioral Approach System (BAS) Dysregulation Theory

Research has emerged providing consistent support for the behavioral approach system (BAS) dysregulation theory of bipolar disorder. The objective of the current article is to examine the extent to which findings from the BAS dysregulation theory can inform psychosocial interventions for bipolar disorder. Towards this end, we first provide an overview of the BAS dysregulation theory. Second, we review extant research on psychosocial interventions for bipolar disorder. And, third, we discuss means by which research and theory in line with the BAS dysregulation model can inform psychosocial interventions for bipolar disorder. Particular attention is given to the clinical implications of research suggesting that bipolar disorder is characterized by high drive/incentive motivation, ambitious goal-setting, and perfectionism in the achievement domain.

Empathy is associated with dynamic change in prefrontal brain electrical activity during positive emotion in children

Empathy is the combined ability to interpret the emotional states of others and experience resultant, related emotions. The relation between prefrontal electroencephalographic asymmetry and emotion in children is well known. The association between positive emotion (assessed via parent report), empathy (measured via observation), and second-by-second brain electrical activity (recorded during a pleasurable task) was investigated using a sample of one hundred twenty-eight 6- to 10-year-old children. Contentment related to increasing left frontopolar activation (p < .05). Empathic concern and positive empathy related to increasing right frontopolar activation (ps < .05). A second form of positive empathy related to increasing left dorsolateral activation (p < .05). This suggests that positive affect and (negative and positive) empathy both relate to changes in prefrontal activity during a pleasurable task.

Dynamic variation in pleasure in children predicts nonlinear change in lateral frontal brain electrical activity

Individual variation in the experience and expression of pleasure may relate to differential patterns of lateral frontal activity. Brain electrical measures have been used to study the asymmetric involvement of lateral frontal cortex in positive emotion, but the excellent time resolution of these measures has not been used to capture second-by-second changes in ongoing emotion until now. The relationship between pleasure and second-by-second lateral frontal activity was examined with the use of hierarchical linear modeling in a sample of 128 children ages 6-10 years. Electroencephalographic activity was recorded during "pop-out toy," a standardized task that elicits pleasure. The task consisted of 3 epochs: an anticipation period sandwiched between 2 play periods. The amount of pleasure expressed during the task predicted the pattern of nonlinear change in lateral frontal activity. Children who expressed increasing amounts of pleasure during the task exhibited increasing left lateral frontal activity during the task, whereas children who expressed contentment exhibited increasing right/decreasing left activity. These findings indicate that task-dependent changes in pleasure relate to dynamic, nonlinear changes in lateral frontal activity as the task unfolds.