The neural development of prosocial behavior from childhood to adolescence

Abstract

The transition from childhood to adolescence is marked by increasingly sophisticated social cognitive abilities that are paralleled by significant functional maturation of the brain. However, the role of social and neurobiological development in facilitating age differences in prosocial behavior remains unclear. Using a cross-sectional sample of children and adolescents (n = 51; 8–16 years), we examined the age-related correlates of prosocial behavior. Youth made costly and non-costly prosocial decisions to anonymous peers during a functional magnetic resonance imaging scan. Among a subsample of youth who made prosocial decisions (n = 35), we found quadratic age differences in neural activation that peaked in early adolescence relative to childhood and older adolescence. In particular, early adolescents showed heightened recruitment of the posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS), temporal pole and inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) when engaging in costly prosocial behavior at the expense of gaining a reward, whereas they evoked heightened pSTS and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex/IFG activation when engaging in costly vs non-costly forms of prosocial behavior. Given that we did not find age differences in prosocial behavior, this suggests that early adolescents show unique patterns of brain activation to inform similar levels of prosocial behavior.

Familiarity and Audience Effects on Giving: A Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study

“…Previous neuroimaging studies provided insights in motivations to give by employing variations of the Dictator Game (Cutler & Campbell-Meiklejohn, 2019;Do et al, 2019;Güroğlu et al, 2009;Van Den Bos et al, 2009;Van Hoorn et al, 2016). The Dictator Game is an economic game, in which participants can share valuable resources with others.…”

“…This manipulation allowed us to compare small to large donations within individuals, thereby controlling for individual differences in giving. We took this approach because some individuals show little or no giving under unrestricted giving conditions, which has been reason to exclude participants in prior studies, thereby limiting generalizability (Do et al, 2019;Telzer et al, 2015). Within the contexts of small and large donations participants could decide on the magnitude of donation, ensuring a sense of volition (Gagné, 2003;Murayama et al, 2013).…”

Eye Gaze Patterns of Decision Process in Prosocial Behavior

“…A large literature in behavioral science emphasizes in the last decades the role of social factors in shaping certain behavioral strategies in various environments Frechette, 2018, 2019;Schmitz, 2019;Proto et al, 2020;Peshkovskaya et al, 2021). Moreover, the evidence of social factor influence on a physiological basis of cognitive processes is shown (Do et al, 2019). For better understanding eye-movement patterns' association with decision strategy, we applied a social psychology minimal group paradigm and the theory of sociality (Lukinova et al, 2014) to enhance participants' strategic behavior and, particularly, its prosocial aspect.…”

Hormonal and neural correlates of prosocial conformity in adolescents

“…While adolescents’ propensity for peer conformity can result in maladaptive behaviors, adolescents also conform to prosocial behaviors such as volunteering and helping others ( Choukas-Bradley et al, 2015 ; for a review, see Guroglu, 2020 ). Engagement in prosocial behaviors increases during adolescence ( Do et al, 2019 ) and has been associated with various positive social and health outcomes ( Eisenberg et al, 2006 ). Increases in neural sensitivity to social information and social rewards during adolescence support changes in peer conformity and prosocial behavior ( Blakemore and Mills, 2014 ; Telzer et al, 2018 ).…”