Weekly Review: Your Brain on Social Rejection, Response to Stress Changed by Your Brain's Little Helpers and Your Gut
Here on LinkedIn, free access to the first part of my weekly roundup of all things the brain and behaviour: some on brain regions that do things you expect, or don‘t expect. You can receive these straight in your inbox or browse on my Substack: https://leadingbrainsreview.substack.com/
Mapping the Brain on Social Rejection
We all know social rejection feels bad - some previous research has shown that it activates parts of the brain associated with pain. This new research by Begüm Babür et al. of the University of Southern California gives us some fascinating new insights.
In a series of clever experiments the researchers explored being selected and ranked by “another person” which was in reality a computer. Participants had written profiles about how trustworthy they were and had been told that they could be selected from a bunch of other participants to take part in a trust game. If selected they received a cash reward this was then multiplied and they then decided how much to donate back.
Each participant received two pieces of feedback: one on whether they had been chosen, and two, on how they were ranked. So you could be ranked highly but not chosen, or ranked lower and chosen, or all other permutations. In real life this is equivalent to, for example, being ranked as a good candidate for a team but not getting it because of limited openings. Alternatively it could also be that scenario when you are picked for a sports team but are the last choice.
Participants brains were scanned while doing this. The first might will come as no surprise and that is that reward drives social preferences and choices i.e. the reward of being chosen has a strong positive effect (and influences positive reinforcement learning). This is all in line with what we would expect but what was more fascinating is that there seem to be two distinct networks: one measuring reward (such as the ventral striatum, if you’re interested) which is associated with reward learning, the other measuring social value, and social areas are activated particularly when ranked low triggering social rejection.
Both, however, can be considered learning mechanisms but fascinating to see two distinct networks for acceptance and social value. This means we can also target these independently. Social value can be given through praise and compliments - and is normally free, for those of you in business.
For a deeper read in the social brain you can read my review from a while back but still relevant:
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I have also reported on other new insights into the social brain:
Social rejection can be stressful and there is also some interesting new research into stress responses.
Your “helping” brain cells, help to deal with stress
You may, or may not know, that your brain has multiple types of cells...read more here
#brain #neuroleadership #stress #neuroscience #neuroladership #socialbrain