Social Reward Questionnaire—Adolescent Version and its association with callous–unemotional traits

Abstract

During adolescence, social interactions are a potent source of reward. However, no measure of social reward value exists for this age group. In this study, we adapted the adult Social Reward Questionnaire, which we had previously developed and validated, for use with adolescents. Participants aged 11–16 (n = 568; 50% male) completed the Social Reward Questionnaire—Adolescent Version (SRQ-A), alongside measures of personality traits—five-factor model (FFM) and callous–unemotional (CU) traits—for construct validity purposes. A confirmatory factor analysis of the SRQ-A supported a five-factor structure (Comparative Fit Index = 0.90; Root Mean Square Error of Approximation = 0.07), equating to five questionnaire subscales: enjoyment of Admiration, Negative Social Potency, Passivity, Prosocial Interactions and Sociability. Associations with FFM and CU traits were in line with what is seen for adult samples, providing support for the meaning of SRQ-A subscales in adolescents. In particular, adolescents with high levels of CU traits showed an ‘inverted’ pattern of social reward, in which being cruel is enjoyable and being kind is not. Gender invariance was also assessed and was partially supported. The SRQ-A is a valid, reliable measure of individual differences in social reward in adolescents.

Giving to Friends, Classmates, and Strangers in Adolescence

“…We measured sensitivity to social rewards with the Dutch adolescent version of the Social Reward Questionnaire (Foulkes et al., ). We used only the sociability and prosocial interactions subscales because of their likelihood to be associated with giving to friends, classmates, and strangers.…”

“…A recent study showed that adolescents who displayed higher sensitivity to social rewards donated more to charity (Kwak & Huettel, ). In this study, we investigated associations between giving and two domains of social rewards, namely prosocial interactions (i.e., feeling rewarded by having kind, reciprocal relationships) and sociability (i.e., feeling rewarded by engaging in group interactions; Foulkes et al., ). These domains are expected to be associated with differences in giving to different peers (i.e., friends, classmates, and strangers) in adolescence.…”

“…These domains are expected to be associated with differences in giving to different peers (i.e., friends, classmates, and strangers) in adolescence. Firstly, we expect the prosocial interactions domain to be associated with greater levels of giving to peers during adolescence because individuals who feel rewarded by this generally act prosocially toward others (Foulkes et al., ). We expect this association to be stronger for close‐relational giving (i.e., stronger for friends than classmates and stronger for classmates than strangers), as closer relationships are more reciprocal in nature (Güroğlu et al., ).…”

“…Prosocial behavior is a complex, multi-faceted construct, referring to various forms of positive other-oriented behavior (e.g., giving, helping, cooperating) directed at interaction partners or targets, such as strangers, friends, and family (Padilla-Walker & Carlo, 2014). Recently, it has been suggested that adolescence is a crucial turning point in the development of prosocial behavior during which young people develop social-affective goals and navigate increasingly complex social worlds (Crone & Dahl, 2012;Foulkes, Neumann, Roberts, McCrory, & Viding, 2017;Kwak & Huettel, 2016). However, it remains poorly understood which processes in adolescence predict prosocial behaviors (Crone & Dahl, 2012) and how this depends on the social context and characteristics of the expresser (G€ uro glu, van den Bos, & Crone, 2014;Padilla-Walker & Carlo, 2014).…”

Neural Dynamic Responses of Monetary and Social Reward Processes in Adolescents

“…Both monetary and social rewards are widely used in scientific research (Izuma et al, 2008;Knutson et al, 2008;Kohls et al, 2009;Trezza et al, 2011;Forbes and Dahl, 2012;Guyer et al, 2012;Somerville, 2013;Stavropoulos and Carver, 2013;Leotti and Delgado, 2014;Weinberg et al, 2014;Foti et al, 2015;Olino et al, 2015;Anderson, 2016;Foulkes et al, 2017;Cao et al, 2018;Oldham et al, 2018;Altikulaç et al, 2019). Researchers have directly compared behavioral performances and neural responses to social and monetary rewards to investigate whether there were differences between them.…”