scholarly journals The neuroscience of social relations. A comparative-based approach to empathy and to the capacity of evaluating others’ action value

Behaviour ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 151 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 297-313 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pier F. Ferrari
Keyword(s):  
Social Relations ◽  
Emotional Processing ◽  
Brain Networks ◽  
Neural Mechanism ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Anterior Cingulate ◽  
Emotional Engagement ◽  
The Social

One of the key questions in understanding human morality is how central are emotions in influencing our decisions and in our moral judgments. Theoretical work has proposed that empathy could play an important role in guiding our tendencies to behave altruistically or selfishly. Neurosciences suggest that one of the core elements of empathic behaviour in human and nonhuman primates is the capacity to internally mimic the behaviour of others, through the activation of shared motor representations. Part of the neural circuits involves parietal and premotor cortical regions (mirror system), in conjunction with other areas, such as the insula and the anterior cingulate cortex. Together with this embodied neural mechanism, there is a cognitive route in which individuals can evaluate the social situation without necessary sharing the emotional state of others. For example, several brain areas of the prefrontal cortex track the effects of one’s own behaviour and of the value of one’s own actions in social contexts. It is here proposed that, moral cognition could emerge as the consequence of the activity of emotional processing brain networks, probably involving mirror mechanisms, and of brain regions that, through abstract-inferential processing, evaluate the social context and the value of actions in terms of abstract representations. A comparative-based approach to the neurobiology of social relations and decision-making may explain how complex mental faculties, such as moral judgments, have their foundations in brain networks endowed with functions related to emotional and abstract-evaluation processing of goods. It is proposed that in primate evolution these brain circuits have been co-opted in the social domain to integrate mechanisms of self-reward, estimation of negative outcomes, with emotional engagement.

Utopia, Labor, and Informational Capitalism

2015 ◽  
pp. 49-68
Author(s):  
Marco Briziarelli
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Social Change ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
User Generated Content ◽  
Economic Approach ◽  
Informational Capitalism ◽  
The Social ◽  
Liberal Ideology ◽  
Political Economic

Through the lens of a political economic approach, I consider the question whether or not social media can promote social change. I claim that whereas media have consistently channeled technological utopia/dystopia, thus be constantly linked to aspirations and fear of social change, the answer to that question does not depend on their specific nature but on historically specific social relations in which media operate. In the case here considered, it requires examining the social relations re-producing and produced by informational capitalism. More specifically, I examine how the productive relations that support user generated content practices of Facebook users affect social media in their capability to reproduce and transform existing social contexts. Drawing on Fuchs and Sevignani's (2013) distinction between “work” and “labor” I claim that social media reflect the ambivalent nature of current capitalist mode of production: a contest in which exploitative/emancipatory as well as reproductive/transformative aspects are articulated by liberal ideology.

Neural Dynamics of Rejection Sensitivity

2007 ◽  
Vol 19 (6) ◽  
pp. 945-956 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ethan Kross ◽  
Tobias Egner ◽  
Kevin Ochsner ◽  
Joy Hirsch ◽  
Geraldine Downey
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Control ◽  
Emotional Processing ◽  
Rejection Sensitivity ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Anterior Cingulate ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Dorsal Anterior Cingulate Cortex ◽  
Affective Stimuli ◽  
Emotional Appraisal ◽  
Interest Level

Rejection sensitivity (RS) is the tendency to anxiously expect, readily perceive, and intensely react to rejection. This study used functional magnetic resonance imaging to explore whether individual differences in RS are mediated by differential recruitment of brain regions involved in emotional appraisal and/or cognitive control. High and low RS participants were scanned while viewing either representational paintings depicting themes of rejection and acceptance or nonrepresentational control paintings matched for positive or negative valence, arousal and interest level. Across all participants, rejection versus acceptance images activated regions of the brain involved in processing affective stimuli (posterior cingulate, insula), and cognitive control (dorsal anterior cingulate cortex; medial frontal cortex). Low and high RS individuals' responses to rejection versus acceptance images were not, however, identical. Low RS individuals displayed significantly more activity in left inferior and right dorsal frontal regions, and activity in these areas correlated negatively with participants' self-report distress ratings. In addition, control analyses revealed no effect of viewing negative versus positive images in any of the areas described above, suggesting that the aforementioned activations were involved in rejection-relevant processing rather than processing negatively valenced stimuli per se. Taken together, these findings suggest that responses in regions traditionally implicated in emotional processing and cognitive control are sensitive to rejection stimuli irrespective of RS, but that low RS individuals may activate prefrontal structures to regulate distress associated with viewing such images.

scholarly journals Neural substrates for moral judgments of psychological versus physical harm

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lily Tsoi ◽  
James A Dungan ◽  
Alek Chakroff ◽  
Liane Young
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Psychological Impact ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Autism Spectrum ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Anterior Cingulate ◽  
Adults With Autism ◽  
Temporoparietal Junction ◽  
The Right ◽  
Multivariate Pattern

Although harm primarily elicits thoughts of physical injuries, harm can also take the form of negative psychological impact. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we examined the extent to which moral judgments of physical and psychological harms are processed similarly, focusing on brain regions implicated in mental state reasoning or theory of mind, a key cognitive process for moral judgment. Univariate analyses reveal similar levels of theory of mind processing for psychological and physical harms, though multivariate pattern analyses (MVPA) reveal sensitivity to the psychological/physical distinction in two regions implicated in theory of mind: the right temporoparietal junction and the precuneus. Moreover, while there were no differences in neurotypical adults and adults with autism spectrum disorder with regard to neural activity related to theory of mind, there was a group difference in the recruitment of the anterior cingulate cortex for psychological versus physical harms. Altogether, these results reveal sensitivity within regions implicated in theory of mind to the physical / psychological distinction as well as neural processes that capture clinically relevant differences in evaluations of psychological harms versus physical harms.

Functional Approaches

2019 ◽  
pp. 179-200
Author(s):  
J. Lachlan Mackenzie
Keyword(s):  
Social Relations ◽  
Information Structure ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Hierarchical Organization ◽  
Language Typology ◽  
English Grammar ◽  
Grammatical Analysis ◽  
The Social ◽  
State Of Mind ◽  
Spatio Temporal

All functional approaches share the conviction that the structure of languages and their historical development are strongly impacted by the cognitive properties of language users, the social relations between them, and the spatio-temporal and socio-cultural contexts in which they operate. This chapter describes how functionalism has impinged on the study of English grammar and covers the interrelations of discourse and grammar, various corpus- and usage-based approaches, the influence of processing considerations, the hierarchical organization of the clause, information structure, the noun phrase, and the contributions of language typology. The grammatical analysis of English has been enriched by the insight that its structures are bound up with our ability to participate in dialogues, to construct written texts, to surmize the state of mind of our conversational partner, to modulate our formulations to maximize politeness, and to use different registers or dialects in different social contexts.

scholarly journals Reorganization of the Social Brain in Individuals with Only One Intact Cerebral Hemisphere

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (8) ◽  
pp. 965
Author(s):  
Dorit Kliemann ◽  
Ralph Adolphs ◽  
Lynn K. Paul ◽  
J. Michael Tyszka ◽  
Daniel Tranel
Keyword(s):  
Social Cognition ◽  
Cerebral Hemisphere ◽  
Emotional Processing ◽  
Brain Networks ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Cortical Activation ◽  
Social Emotional ◽  
Social Brain ◽  
Left And Right

Social cognition and emotion are ubiquitous human processes that recruit a reliable set of brain networks in healthy individuals. These brain networks typically comprise midline (e.g., medial prefrontal cortex) as well as lateral regions of the brain including homotopic regions in both hemispheres (e.g., left and right temporo-parietal junction). Yet the necessary roles of these networks, and the broader roles of the left and right cerebral hemispheres in socioemotional functioning, remains debated. Here, we investigated these questions in four rare adults whose right (three cases) or left (one case) cerebral hemisphere had been surgically removed (to a large extent) to treat epilepsy. We studied four closely matched healthy comparison participants, and also compared the patient findings to data from a previously published larger healthy comparison sample (n = 33). Participants completed standardized socioemotional and cognitive assessments to investigate social cognition. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data were obtained during passive viewing of a short, animated movie that distinctively recruits two social brain networks: one engaged when thinking about other agents’ internal mental states (e.g., beliefs, desires, emotions; so-called Theory of Mind or ToM network), and the second engaged when thinking about bodily states (e.g., pain, hunger; so-called PAIN network). Behavioral assessments demonstrated remarkably intact general cognitive functioning in all individuals with hemispherectomy. Social-emotional functioning was somewhat variable in the hemispherectomy participants, but strikingly, none of these individuals had consistently impaired social-emotional processing and none of the assessment scores were consistent with a psychiatric disorder. Using inter-region correlation analyses, we also found surprisingly typical ToM and PAIN networks, as well as typical differentiation of the two networks (in the intact hemisphere of patients with either right or left hemispherectomy), based on idiosyncratic reorganization of cortical activation. The findings argue that compensatory brain networks can process social and emotional information following hemispherectomy across different age levels (from 3 months to 20 years old), and suggest that social brain networks typically distributed across midline and lateral brain regions in this domain can be reorganized, to a substantial degree.

scholarly journals Instrumental approach towards tradition in the conceptual and social contexts

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Dmitry Vladimirovich Rakhinsky ◽  
Grigorii Andreevich Illarionov ◽  
Anna Nikolaevna Gorodishcheva ◽  
Nikolai Alekseevich Knyazev
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Historical Memory ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Cross Effect ◽  
Instrumental Approach ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Public Consciousness ◽  
The Subject

  The subject of this research is the dynamics of conceptualization of the phenomenon of cultural reproduction, expressed in the concepts of tradition and cultural memory, as well as the related concepts of the invention of tradition, historical memory, and post-truth. The article analyzes the transformation of epistemological approach that took place in the late XX century towards reproduction of culture, reflected in the change of the fundamental conceptual metaphor – from “delivery”(traditio) to “memory”, which means a shift in the dominant approach towards the structure of cultural continuum that appears to be attributed not to the objective reproducible content, rather than its construction by the subject. It is suggested to examine the questions of current interrelation between post-truth and public consciousness. The author creates an instrumental approach towards tradition, which is characterized by pragmatism expressed in the intention towards management of social relations, where tradition is a tool for managing the present through the formation of representations about the past, and constructivism, which implies that tradition is a construct of perception formed in the present, not reflecting the past itself. Being internalized in a broad social context, the instrumental approach is realized within the framework of the state of post-truth, which does not consider the past crucial for the formation of public opinion compared to other personal beliefs, as well as management methods applied to the latter. Problematization of the theme of post-truth demonstrates the internalization of instrumental approach into a broad social context, indicating the cross-effect pf epistemological and general cultural social context with regards to problem of interrelation between the social past and the present.  

scholarly journals Attachment to Mobile Phones across Social Contexts

2015 ◽  
pp. 222-233 ◽  
Author(s):  
Burçe Çelik ◽  
Fırat Erdoğmuş
Keyword(s):  
Mobile Phone ◽  
Mobile Phones ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Social Acceptance ◽  
Cultural Landscapes ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Social ◽  
Critical Literature

This article presents a critical literature review of the major works on mobile phone culture, which examine the whys and wherefores of this technology's popularity in different socio-economic and cultural landscapes. Thus, it focuses particularly on how these multiplicities and varieties have been discussed, analyzed and researched in the existing mobile phone literature. There are different lines of research which can be categorized as following: the major works (mostly empirical studies whose findings are based on fieldwork) that demonstrate the mobile phone's use and instrumental value for people who are physically mobile and need instantaneous and spontaneous connections with others; the works that focus on the social promise of the mobile phone such as providing a means of social acceptance, through implying social status and particular lifestyles to polish one's face and gain recognition in social relations; and finally the studies that emphasize the sensing, affecting and affected, and fantasies of the body and the collective in contemplating the bond between body and mobile phone.

Utopia, Labor, and Informational Capitalism

2019 ◽  
pp. 817-836
Author(s):  
Marco Briziarelli
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Social Change ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
User Generated Content ◽  
Economic Approach ◽  
Informational Capitalism ◽  
The Social ◽  
Liberal Ideology ◽  
Political Economic

Through the lens of a political economic approach, I consider the question whether or not social media can promote social change. I claim that whereas media have consistently channeled technological utopia/dystopia, thus be constantly linked to aspirations and fear of social change, the answer to that question does not depend on their specific nature but on historically specific social relations in which media operate. In the case here considered, it requires examining the social relations re-producing and produced by informational capitalism. More specifically, I examine how the productive relations that support user generated content practices of Facebook users affect social media in their capability to reproduce and transform existing social contexts. Drawing on Fuchs and Sevignani's (2013) distinction between “work” and “labor” I claim that social media reflect the ambivalent nature of current capitalist mode of production: a contest in which exploitative/emancipatory as well as reproductive/transformative aspects are articulated by liberal ideology.

scholarly journals Speculations on the Evolutionary Origins of System Justification

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 147470491876534 ◽  
Author(s):  
John T. Jost ◽  
Robert M. Sapolsky ◽  
H. Hannah Nam
Keyword(s):  
Social Economic ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
System Justification ◽  
Anterior Cingulate ◽  
Social Stability ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
System Justification Theory ◽  
Evolutionary Origins ◽  
The Social

For centuries, philosophers and social theorists have wondered why people submit voluntarily to tyrannical leaders and oppressive regimes. In this article, we speculate on the evolutionary origins of system justification, that is, the ways in which people are motivated (often nonconsciously) to defend and justify existing social, economic, and political systems. After briefly recounting the logic of system justification theory and some of the most pertinent empirical evidence, we consider parallels between the social behaviors of humans and other animals concerning the acceptance versus rejection of hierarchy and dominance. Next, we summarize research in human neuroscience suggesting that specific brain regions, such as the amygdala and the anterior cingulate cortex, may be linked to individual differences in ideological preferences concerning (in)equality and social stability as well as the successful navigation of complex, hierarchical social systems. Finally, we consider some of the implications of a system justification perspective for the study of evolutionary psychology, political behavior, and social change.

scholarly journals Identity in different contexts: Traditionalism, modernism and postmodernism

2016 ◽  
pp. 103-112
Author(s):  
Miomirka Lucic
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Strong Influence ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Traditional Form ◽  
Theoretical Approaches ◽  
The Social ◽  
Market Ideology

The paper puts emphasis on the experience of cultural identity through various social contexts: traditionalism, modernism and postmodernism. Special attention is directed towards the analysis of the position of an individual, and the social framework in which that individual creates his/her identity. Analysis of different theoretical approaches reveals that the cultural identity is a category which permanently changes, but we should not lose sight of the fact that there are certain determinants which suggest that cultural identity in traditional, modern and postmodern societies bears certain similarities. In most scientific studies there is a claim that an individual overcame his/her ontological connection to community and dependence on it, and that reflexivity becomes the norm. However, if you go deeper into the essence of social relations you can find that space for individuality and free acting of an individual is freed from heteronomy as a traditional form of behavior, but not freed from the strong influence of market ideology that largely determines and affects human activities. Therefore, an individual more and more consumes what already exits, while less and less acts as an authentic creator. That dependence goes through a metamorphosis, expressing itself in a different form and with different intensity in different social contexts, but does not disappear.

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