Lecture 8 - Social Neuroscience: Understanding others

The Social Brain: Critical Perspectives on Science, Society and Neurodiversity

Richard Ramsey

Today


Part 1

  • Social Neuroscience: Understanding others


Part 2

  • Read articles and discuss



Understanding others

For an overview, See Chapter 6 from Ward (2022)

Overview


  • Recap “Social Brain” circuits

  • Background

  • Cognitive and brain systems

    • Mirror neuron system
    • Theory of mind network

Recap social brain circuits

Social brain circuits


(Adolphs, 2009; Stanley & Adolphs, 2013)

Background

Mindreading?


Beliefs about beliefs


Spontaneous













(Frischen et al., 2007)

Why is it important?

prediction

Why is it important?

manipulation

Why is it important?

joint action

Cognitive and brain systems

  • Mirror neuron system
  • Theory of mind network

Mirror neurons

Mirror neurons in macaques


F5 and PF

(di Pellegrino et al., 1992; Fogassi et al., 2005; Gallese et al., 1996)

Mirror neuron system in humans


The direct matching hypothesis

(Gazzola & Keysers, 2009; Rizzolatti et al., 2001)

Theory of mind

ToM = reasoning about mental states

Le Tricheur à l’as de carreau by Georges de la Tour (c. 1635)

Theory of mind development

The false belief task

(Wimmer & Perner, 1983)

Brain circuits


  • mPFC: person knowledge

  • TPJ: false belief, perspective taking

  • TP: social scripts, emotion, convergence ?

(Schurz et al., 2014; Van Overwalle, 2009)

Caution

(Schaafsma et al., 2015)

Mirroring and theory of mind

(de Lange et al., 2008)

Mirroring and theory of mind


  • Complementary roles in social cognition.

  • How do they influence each other?

  • Lots of open and unanswered questions.

  • Essay questions?

(Keysers & Gazzola, 2007)

Take a break

Part 2 - Read and discuss

Discussion material


References

Adolphs, R. (2009). The Social Brain: Neural Basis of Social Knowledge. Annual Review of Psychology, 60(1), 693–716. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.60.110707.163514
de Lange, F. P., Spronk, M., Willems, R. M., Toni, I., & Bekkering, H. (2008). Complementary Systems for Understanding Action Intentions. 18(6), 454–457. http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0960982208002443
di Pellegrino, G., Fadiga, L., Fogassi, L., Gallese, V., & Rizzolatti, G. (1992). Understanding motor events: A neurophysiological study. Exp Brain Res, 91(1), 176–180. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?db=m&form=6&dopt=r&uid=1301372
Fogassi, L., Ferrari, P. F., Gesierich, B., Rozzi, S., Chersi, F., & Rizzolatti, G. (2005). Parietal lobe: From action organization to intention understanding. Science, 308(5722), 662–667. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&dopt=Citation&list_uids=15860620
Frischen, A., Bayliss, A. P., & Tipper, S. P. (2007). Gaze cueing of attention: Visual attention, social cognition, and individual differences. Psychological Bulletin, 133(4), 694–724. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.133.4.694
Gallese, V., Fadiga, L., Fogassi, L., & Rizzolatti, G. (1996). Action recognition in the premotor cortex. Brain, 119, 593–609. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?db=m&form=6&dopt=r&uid=8800951
Gazzola, V., & Keysers, C. (2009). The Observation and Execution of Actions Share Motor and Somatosensory Voxels in all Tested Subjects: Single-Subject Analyses of Unsmoothed fMRI Data. Cereb. Cortex, 19(6), 1239–1255. https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhn181
Keysers, C., & Gazzola, V. (2007). Integrating simulation and theory of mind: From self to social cognition. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 11(5), 194–196. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6VH9-4N6FP38-1/2/c0d4d005fb34fcc551931b6a48cacc6a
Rizzolatti, G., Fogassi, L., & Gallese, V. (2001). Neurophysiological mechanisms underlying the understanding and imitation of action. Nat Rev Neurosci, 2(9), 661–70. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?db=m&form=6&dopt=r&uid=11533734
Schaafsma, S. M., Pfaff, D. W., Spunt, R. P., & Adolphs, R. (2015). Deconstructing and reconstructing theory of mind. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 19(2), 65–72. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2014.11.007
Schurz, M., Radua, J., Aichhorn, M., Richlan, F., & Perner, J. (2014). Fractionating theory of mind: A meta-analysis of functional brain imaging studies. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 42(0), 9–34. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2014.01.009
Stanley, D. A., & Adolphs, R. (2013). Toward a Neural Basis for Social Behavior. Neuron, 80(3), 816–826. http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0896627313009902
Van Overwalle, F. (2009). Social cognition and the brain: A meta-analysis. Hum. Brain Mapp., 30, 829.
Ward, J. (2022). The Student’s Guide to Social Neuroscience (3rd ed.). Psychology Press. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003057697
Wimmer, H., & Perner, J. (1983). Beliefs about beliefs: Representation and constraining function of wrong beliefs in young children’s understanding of deception. Cognition, 13(1), 103–128. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&dopt=Citation&list_uids=6681741

Acknowledgements