Social contexts are rife with uncertainty. Consequently, much of our sensory apparatus and cognitive skill is applied to reducing this volatility by acquiring information about others. The brain mechanisms that evaluate social information and translate it into decisions, however, remain poorly understood-despite clear dysfunction of these mechanisms in neurological disorders such as autism, social anxiety, and anorexia which are characterized by dysfunctional social motivation and decision making. We hypothesize that social signals are first decoded by several distinct brain areas, including superior temporal sulcus (STS) and amygdala, translated into value signals in the ventral striatum (VS), and transformed into a common currency for comparison and exchange with other types of rewards in the orbital (OFC) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). We propose to use complementary fMRI techniques in human subjects and electrophysiological techniques in macaques to test this hypothesis. Critically, we will use the same psychophysical technique to estimate reward functions for social stimuli in humans and monkeys, thus validating our comparison. Crucially, temporary inactivation of nodes in this network in monkeys and comparison with fMRI results in a high-functioning clinical population with social dysfunction will be used to functionally evaluate our model.
The brain mechanisms that evaluate social information and translate it into decisions remain poorly understood-despite clear dysfunction of these mechanisms in neurological disorders such as autism, social anxiety, and anorexia nervosa which are characterized by dysfunctional social motivation and decision making. We hypothesize that social signals are first decoded by several distinct brain areas, including superior temporal sulcus (STS) and amygdala, translated into value signals in the ventral striatum (VS), and transformed into a common currency for comparison and exchange with other types of rewards in the orbital (OFC) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). We will use complementary fMRI techniques in human subjects and electrophysiological techniques in macaques to test this hypothesis, and functionally validate these observations by determining the locus of dysfunctional social reward processing in a psychiatric population characterized by maladaptive social behavior.
| Tremblay, Sébastien; Sharika, K M; Platt, Michael L (2017) Social Decision-Making and the Brain: A Comparative Perspective. Trends Cogn Sci 21:265-276 |
| San Martín, René; Kwak, Youngbin; Pearson, John M et al. (2016) Altruistic traits are predicted by neural responses to monetary outcomes for self vs charity. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci 11:863-76 |
| Ebitz, R Becket; Platt, Michael L (2015) Neuronal activity in primate dorsal anterior cingulate cortex signals task conflict and predicts adjustments in pupil-linked arousal. Neuron 85:628-40 |
| Roy, Arani; Shepherd, Stephen V; Platt, Michael L (2014) Reversible inactivation of pSTS suppresses social gaze following in the macaque (Macaca mulatta). Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci 9:209-17 |
| Chang, Steve W C; Platt, Michael L (2014) Oxytocin and social cognition in rhesus macaques: implications for understanding and treating human psychopathology. Brain Res 1580:57-68 |
| Brent, Lauren J N; Chang, Steve W C; Gariépy, Jean-François et al. (2014) The neuroethology of friendship. Ann N Y Acad Sci 1316:1-17 |
| Pearson, John M; Watson, Karli K; Platt, Michael L (2014) Decision making: the neuroethological turn. Neuron 82:950-65 |
| Pearson, John M; Platt, Michael L (2013) Dopamine: burning the candle at both ends. Neuron 79:831-3 |
| Klein, Jeffrey T; Platt, Michael L (2013) Social information signaling by neurons in primate striatum. Curr Biol 23:691-6 |
| Ebitz, R Becket; Watson, Karli K; Platt, Michael L (2013) Oxytocin blunts social vigilance in the rhesus macaque. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 110:11630-5 |
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