Neural reuse in the social and emotional brain

2010 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 275-276 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Helen Immordino-Yang ◽  
Joan Y. Chiao ◽  
Alan P. Fiske

AbstractPresenting evidence from the social brain, we argue that neural reuse is a dynamic, socially organized process that is influenced ontogenetically and evolutionarily by the cultural transmission of mental techniques, values, and modes of thought. Anderson's theory should be broadened to accommodate cultural effects on the functioning of architecturally similar neural systems, and the implications of these differences for reuse.

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michal Ramot ◽  
Catherine Walsh ◽  
Gabrielle E. Reimann ◽  
Alex Martin

AbstractExtensive study of typically developing individuals and those on the autism spectrum has identified a large number of brain regions associated with our ability to navigate the social world. Although it is widely appreciated that this so-called ‘social brain’ is composed of distinct, interacting systems, these component parts have yet to be clearly elucidated. Here we used measures of eye movement and neural typicality – based on the degree to which subjects deviated from the norm – while typically developing (N = 62) and individuals with autism (N = 36) watched a large battery of movies depicting social interactions. Our findings provide clear evidence for distinct, but overlapping, neural systems underpinning two major components of the ‘social brain’, social orienting and inferring the mental state of others.


2011 ◽  
Vol 23 (8) ◽  
pp. 1911-1920 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Ida Gobbini ◽  
Claudio Gentili ◽  
Emiliano Ricciardi ◽  
Claudia Bellucci ◽  
Pericle Salvini ◽  
...  

We designed an fMRI experiment comparing perception of human faces and robotic faces producing emotional expressions. The purpose of our experiment was to investigate engagement of different parts of the social brain by viewing these animate and inanimate agents. Both human and robotic face expressions evoked activity in face-responsive regions in the fusiform gyrus and STS and in the putative human mirror neuron system. These results suggest that these areas mediate perception of agency, independently of whether the agents are living or not. By contrast, the human faces evoked stronger activity than did robotic faces in the medial pFC and the anterior temporal cortex—areas associated with the representation of others' mental states (theory of mind), whereas robotic faces evoked stronger activity in areas associated with perception of objects and mechanical movements. Our data demonstrate that the representation of the distinction between animate and inanimate agents involves areas that participate in attribution of mental stance.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Allen Thornton ◽  
Miriam E. Weaverdyck ◽  
Judith Mildner ◽  
Diana Tamir

One can never know the internal workings of another person – one can only infer others’ mental states based on external cues. In contrast, each person has direct access to the contents of their own mind. Here we test the hypothesis that this privileged access shapes the way people represent internal mental experiences, such that they represent their own mental states more distinctly than the states of others. Across four studies, participants considered their own and others’ mental states; analyses measured the distinctiveness of mental state representations. Two neuroimaging studies used representational similarity analyses to demonstrate that the social brain manifests more distinct activity patterns when thinking about one’s own states versus others’. Two behavioral studies support these findings. Further, they demonstrate that people differentiate between states less as social distance increases. Together these results suggest that we represent our own mind with greater granularity than the minds of others.


Author(s):  
Dianne Toe ◽  
Louise Paatsch ◽  
Amy Szarkowski

Deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) children who use spoken language face unique challenges when communicating with others who have typical hearing, particularly their peers. In such contexts, the social use of language has been recognized as an area of vulnerability among individuals in this population and has become a focus for research and intervention. The development of pragmatic skills intersects with many aspects of child development, including emotional intelligence and executive function, as well as social and emotional development. While all these areas are important, they are beyond the scope of this chapter, which highlights the impact of pragmatics on the specific area of cognition. Cognitive pragmatics is broadly defined as the study of the mental processes involved in the understanding of meaning in the context of a cooperative interaction. This chapter explores how DHH children and young people construe meaning in the context of conversations and expository interactions with their peers. The chapter aims to examine the role played by the cognitive processes of making inferences and comprehending implicature, within the overall display of pragmatic skills. Further, the authors use this lens in the analysis of interactions between DHH children and their peers in order to shed light on the development of pragmatic skills in children who are DHH.


2021 ◽  
pp. 153450842098452
Author(s):  
Christopher L. Thomas ◽  
Staci M. Zolkoski ◽  
Sarah M. Sass

Educators and educational support staff are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of systematic efforts to support students’ social and emotional growth. Logically, the success of social-emotional learning programs depends upon the ability of educators to assess student’s ability to process and utilize social-emotional information and use data to guide programmatic revisions. Therefore, the purpose of the current examination was to provide evidence of the structural validity of the Social-Emotional Learning Scale (SELS), a freely available measure of social-emotional learning, within Grades 6 to 12. Students ( N = 289, 48% female, 43.35% male, 61% Caucasian) completed the SELS and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. Confirmatory factor analyses of the SELS failed to support a multidimensional factor structure identified in prior investigations. The results of an exploratory factor analysis suggest a reduced 16-item version of the SELS captures a unidimensional social-emotional construct. Furthermore, our results provide evidence of the internal consistency and concurrent validity of the reduced-length version of the instrument. Our discussion highlights the implications of the findings to social and emotional learning educational efforts and promoting evidence-based practice.


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