Orbital prefrontal cortex volume predicts social network size: an imaging study of individual differences in humans

Powell, Joanne; Lewis, Penelope A.; Roberts, Neil; Garcı́a-Fiñana, Marta; Dunbar, Robin

doi:10.1098/rspb.2011.2574

Cited by 170 publications

(155 citation statements)

References 62 publications

(86 reference statements)

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“…For example, using structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), Bickart et al [58] showed that the size of the amygdala-a brain nucleus important for emotion, vigilance and rapid behavioural responses-is correlated with social network size in humans. Subsequent studies showed similar relationships for other brain regions implicated in social function, including the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) [59] and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) [60]. One study even found an association between grey matter density in the superior temporal sulcus (STS) and temporal gyrus and an individual's number of Facebook friends [61].…”

Section: Mechanisms Mediating the Evaluation Of Social Partners' Valumentioning

confidence: 89%

Adaptations for social cognition in the primate brain

Platt

Seyfarth

Cheney

2016

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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One contribution of 18 to a theme issue 'The evolution of cooperation based on direct fitness benefits'. Studies of the factors affecting reproductive success in group-living monkeys have traditionally focused on competitive traits, like the acquisition of high dominance rank. Recent research, however, indicates that the ability to form cooperative social bonds has an equally strong effect on fitness. Two implications follow. First, strong social bonds make individuals' fitness interdependent and the 'free-rider' problem disappears. Second, individuals must make adaptive choices that balance competition and cooperation-often with the same partners. The proximate mechanisms underlying these behaviours are only just beginning to be understood. Recent results from cognitive and systems neuroscience provide us some evidence that many social and nonsocial decisions are mediated ultimately by abstract, domain-general neural mechanisms. However, other populations of neurons in the orbitofrontal cortex, striatum, amygdala and parietal cortex specifically encode the type, importance and value of social information. Whether these specialized populations of neurons arise by selection or through developmental plasticity in response to the challenges of social life remains unknown. Many brain areas are homologous and show similar patterns of activity in human and nonhuman primates. In both groups, cortical activity is modulated by hormones like oxytocin and by the action of certain genes that may affect individual differences in behaviour. Taken together, results suggest that differences in cooperation between the two groups are a matter of degree rather than constituting a fundamental, qualitative distinction.

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Section: Mechanisms Mediating the Evaluation Of Social Partners' Valumentioning

confidence: 89%

Adaptations for social cognition in the primate brain

Platt

Seyfarth

Cheney

2016

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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“…Finally, to examine evidence for the behavioral relevance of our findings, we tested whether coupling indices are associated with parameters of the subject's social functioning, as indexed by the average complexity of a pair's social networks. The self-report questionnaire social network index (SNI) (22) is a repeatedly used measure describing the complexity and size of the social network a subject is embedded in, and has been found to be related to neural markers such as the volume and function of socially relevant brain regions (23)(24)(25)(26). Indeed, the coupling index proved to be significantly positively associated with the mean social network complexity of real pairs (repeated measures ANOVA; F = 5.0, P = 0.03).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Information flow between interacting human brains: Identification, validation, and relationship to social expertise

Bilek¹,

Ruf

Schäfer³

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

137

130

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Social interactions are fundamental for human behavior, but the quantification of their neural underpinnings remains challenging. Here, we used hyperscanning functional MRI (fMRI) to study information flow between brains of human dyads during real-time social interaction in a joint attention paradigm. In a hardware setup enabling immersive audiovisual interaction of subjects in linked fMRI scanners, we characterize cross-brain connectivity components that are unique to interacting individuals, identifying information flow between the sender's and receiver's temporoparietal junction. We replicate these findings in an independent sample and validate our methods by demonstrating that cross-brain connectivity relates to a key real-world measure of social behavior. Together, our findings support a central role of human-specific cortical areas in the brain dynamics of dyadic interactions and provide an approach for the noninvasive examination of the neural basis of healthy and disturbed human social behavior with minimal a priori assumptions.fMRI | hyperscanning | joint attention H uman social interactions have likely shaped brain evolution and are critical for development, health, and society. Defining their neural underpinnings is a key goal of social neuroscience. Interacting dyads, the simplest and fundamental form of human interaction, have been examined with behavioral setups that used real movement interactions during communication in real time as a proxy (1-4), providing mathematical models representing human interaction, goal sharing, mutual engagement, and coordination. To identify the neural systems supporting these behaviors, neuroimaging would be the tool of choice, but studying dyadic interactions with this method is both experimentally and analytically challenging. Consequently, the neural processes underlying human social interactions remain incompletely understood.Experimentally, studying dyads with neuroimaging technology that allows only one participant per scanner provides challenges that have been addressed in the literature in one of two ways. First, the audiovisual experiences of human social contact have been simulated using stimuli such as photographs, recorded videos, or computerized avatars in the absence of human interaction (5-7), or, recently, immersive audiovisual linkups have been used with one of the two participants being scanned (8, 9). Secondly, pioneering neuroimaging experiments have coupled two scanner sites over the Internet, a setup called hyperscanning, enabling subjects to observe higher-level behavioral responses such as choices made to accept or reject an offer in real time while in the scanners (10, 11). In the current study, we aimed to combine the advantages of these experimental approaches by enabling two humans to see (and possibly hear) each other in a hyperscanning framework, enabling an immersive social interaction while both participant's brains are imaged. To do so, we implemented a setup with delay-free data transmission and precisely synchronized data acquisitio...

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“…3) have reported that individuals' social network size and complexity correlated with gray matter in the vmPFC (45,46), amygdala (47,48), and lTPJ (45). Moreover, individual macaques' gray matter in the mPFC and regions approximating human TPJ covary with both social network size (which was experimentally assigned) and social status (49,50).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neural mechanisms tracking popularity in real-world social networks

Zerubavel

Bearman

Weber

et al. 2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

102

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Differences in popularity are a key aspect of status in virtually all human groups and shape social interactions within them. Little is known, however, about how we track and neurally represent others' popularity. We addressed this question in two real-world social networks using sociometric methods to quantify popularity. Each group member (perceiver) viewed faces of every other group member (target) while whole-brain functional MRI data were collected. Independent functional localizer tasks were used to identify brain systems supporting affective valuation (ventromedial prefrontal cortex, ventral striatum, amygdala) and social cognition (dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, precuneus, temporoparietal junction), respectively. During the face-viewing task, activity in both types of neural systems tracked targets' sociometric popularity, even when controlling for potential confounds. The target popularity-social cognition system relationship was mediated by valuation system activity, suggesting that observing popular individuals elicits value signals that facilitate understanding their mental states. The target popularity-valuation system relationship was strongest for popular perceivers, suggesting enhanced sensitivity to differences among other group members' popularity. Popular group members also demonstrated greater interpersonal sensitivity by more accurately predicting how their own personalities were perceived by other individuals in the social network. These data offer insights into the mechanisms by which status guides social behavior.social status | fMRI | social network | popularity | social cognition

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Orbital prefrontal cortex volume predicts social network size: an imaging study of individual differences in humans

Cited by 170 publications

References 62 publications

Adaptations for social cognition in the primate brain

Adaptations for social cognition in the primate brain

Information flow between interacting human brains: Identification, validation, and relationship to social expertise

Neural mechanisms tracking popularity in real-world social networks

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