Social neuroscience and its potential contribution to psychiatry

Abstract

Most mental disorders involve disruptions of normal social behavior. Social neuroscience is an interdisciplinary field devoted to understanding the biological systems underlying social processes and behavior, and the influence of the social environment on biological processes, health and well-being. Research in this field has grown dramatically in recent years. Active areas of research include brain imaging studies in normal children and adults, animal models of social behavior, studies of stroke patients, imaging studies of psychiatric patients, and research on social determinants of peripheral neural, neuroendocrine and immunological processes. Although research in these areas is proceeding along largely independent trajectories, there is increasing evidence for connections across these trajectories. We focus here on the progress and potential of social neuroscience in psychiatry, including illustrative evidence for a rapid growth of neuroimaging and genetic studies of mental disorders. We also argue that neuroimaging and genetic research focused on specific component processes underlying social living is needed.

Negative symptoms in youths with psychosis spectrum features: Complementary scales in relation to neurocognitive performance and function

“…The slower response time on social cognition tests, evident in schizophrenia and, to a lesser extent, in CHR, is consistent with growing literature on deficits in emotion processing (Kohler et al, 2014) and other measures of social cognition in SZ and CHR (Allott et al, 2014; Amminger et al, 2012; Irani et al, 2012; Meyer et al, 2014; Walther et al, 2015). Such effects support recent emphasis on social neuroscience as offering unique pathways to elucidating neuropsychiatric disorders (Adolphs and Anderson, 2013; Cacioppo et al, 2014). …”

The basic discipline of psychiatry as metatext

“…The list of hybrid terms to suggest either complementation or juxtaposition is too long to reproduce here (biopsychosocial, psychosomatic, neuropsychiatry). But one of its recent formulations -social neuroscience-has been received with enthusiasm by authors commenting on a paper by Cacioppo et al (2) in World Psychiatry. This Forum provides an opportunity for a critical appraisal of current thinking and for examining what respondents provide or accept and what they miss or lack.…”

Social neuroscience and mechanisms of risk for mental disorders

“…How is it possible that the brain's neural activity is directly dependent upon environmental contingencies? This is a central question raised by Cacioppo et al's impressive target paper (1), which I will tackle here by bringing in a novel perspective, the brain's intrinsic activity.…”

“…In their thoughtful paper, Cacioppo et al (1) emphasize the role of social neuroscience as an integrative meeting ground of a variety of methodological approaches, "neural, hormonal, cellular, molecular and genetic", and call for a truly "interdisciplinary" approach. We fully endorse this viewpoint and would like to emphasize the importance to apply this strategy at another important, but underexamined juncture between disciplines: the connection between psychiatric epidemiology and psychiatric neuroscience.…”