A Role for Uncertainty in the Neural Distinction Between Social and Nonsocial Thought

Abstract

Neuroimaging research has identified a network of brain regions that is consistently more engaged when people think about the minds of other people than when they engage in nonsocial tasks. Activations in this “mentalizing network” are sometimes interpreted as evidence for the domain-specificity of cognitive processes supporting social thought. Here, we examine the alternative possibility that at least some activations in the mentalizing network may be explained by uncertainty. A reconsideration of findings from existing functional MRI studies in light of new data from independent raters suggests that (a) social tasks used in past studies have higher levels of uncertainty than their nonsocial comparison tasks and (b) activation in a key brain region associated with social cognition, the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (DMPFC), may track with the degree of uncertainty surrounding both social and nonsocial inferences. These observations suggest that the preferential DMPFC response observed consistently in social scenarios may reflect the engagement of domain-general processes of uncertainty reduction, which points to avenues for future research into the core cognitive mechanisms supporting typical and atypical social thought.

When uncertainty in social contexts increases exploration and decreases obtained rewards.

“…In Experiments 1 and 2, we showed that, when little information about the social environment is provided, participants demonstrated more exploration in a social versus nonsocial context. Enhanced exploration is consistent with the idea that social contexts present additional uncertainty (Berkay & Jenkins, 2023) that, in the absence of other social information, learners attempt to resolve through search and sampling of options. In Experiments 3 and 4, we observed that enhanced exploration in a social context can be reduced by providing relevant social information.…”

“…In concert, the limitations and future directions highlight the idea that there are likely many mechanisms underlying the differences between social and nonsocial contexts. In other words, the "socialness" of a context will contain myriad features, including heightened uncertainty (see Berkay & Jenkins, 2023 for an in-depth examination of this idea), but perhaps also heightened stakes for rewards receipt or other features. As one step to understanding additional features, we conducted one additional experiment-"Experiment 5" (see the online supplemental materials) to investigate a possible role in individuation of the reward-generating entities.…”

“…Initiating conversations with newer acquaintances (exploring new social connections) could result in a more or less enjoyable outcome, but either way, it provides you with previously unknown information that could potentially help you make predictions about your enjoyment of various lunchtime companions in the future. Exploration decisions might be especially complex in social situations, like this one, because the factors affecting different outcomes are associated with substantial uncertainty: the internal states that drive other people's behavior are hidden from view, dynamic, and responsive to the behavior of others (Berkay & Jenkins, 2023;Dennett, 1987;Fiske, 1993). Recent research provides evidence to suggest that there is a meaningful link between exploratory behavior and real-world social environments and networks (Saragosa-Harris et al, 2022), including that individuals from more diverse social environments forge connections between previously unconnected groups (Wood et al, 2023), and that individuals use statistical inference to infer the relatedness of these networks (which, might in turn influence exploration; Sehl et al, 2022).…”

“…Relatively high unpredictability and ambiguity in the social world have been well documented (e.g., Berkay & Jenkins, 2023; FeldmanHall & Shenhav, 2019; Hertwig & Herzog, 2009; Jenkins & Mitchell, 2010). Individuals may need to turn to behavioral exploration to resolve this uncertainty in social contexts.…”

A rule-based theoretical account of social stories to address the double empathy problem

“…Autism is associated with elevated levels of intolerance of uncertainty, which mediates between autistic traits and anxiety ( Boulter et al, 2014 ; Vasa et al, 2018 ; Jenkinson et al, 2020 ). It has recently been suggested that social situations are difficult for autistic individuals precisely because of their inherently uncertain nature (rather than their social nature per se , Berkay and Jenkins, 2022 ).…”