Humans are highly motivated to attend to socially relevant information, such as the proximity and attentional states of others. The neural basis of socially-motivated attention, however, remains poorly understood, despite the fact that the disruption of these mechanisms is a primary characteristic of several debilitating emotional disorders, including autism. The proposed research therefore aims to develop an animal model of the neurophysiology of socially-motivated attention. Two studies will investigate neuronal activation in the parietal cortex, an area that is known to be crucial in mediating visuo-spatial attention and is suggested, by neuroimaging data, to be crucial for socially-motivated attention. In one study, the activation of parietal neurons will be investigated while monkeys choose to attend to social or non-social stimuli. In the second study, parietal activity will examined when monkeys utilize the perceived gaze direction of a conspecific to orient their own attention. Together these studies will provide an improved understanding of the neural basis of social attention in healthy individuals and thus will contribute to the development of new treatments for autism and other debilitating disorders. ? ?
