Department of Human Development and Family Sciences, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, TX 79409, USA.
Department of Human Development and Family Studies, Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA 16801, USA.
Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2022 Nov 2;17(11):1007-1020. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsac025.
Social learning theory posits that adolescents learn to adopt social norms by observing the behaviors of others and internalizing the associated outcomes. However, the underlying neural processes by which social learning occurs is less well-understood, despite extensive neurobiological reorganization and a peak in social influence sensitivity during adolescence. Forty-four adolescents (Mage = 12.2 years) completed an fMRI scan while observing their older sibling within four years of age (Mage = 14.3 years) of age complete a risky decision-making task. Group iterative multiple model estimation (GIMME) was used to examine patterns of directional brain region connectivity supporting social learning. We identified group-level neural pathways underlying social observation including the anterior insula to the anterior cingulate cortex and mentalizing regions to social cognition regions. We also found neural states based on adolescent sensitivity to social learning via age, gender, modeling, differentiation, and behavior. Adolescents who were more likely to be influenced elicited neurological up-regulation whereas adolescents who were less likely to be socially influenced elicited neurological down-regulation during risk-taking. These findings highlight patterns of how adolescents process information while a salient influencer takes risks, as well as salient neural pathways that are dependent on similarity factors associated with social learning theory.
社会学习理论认为，青少年通过观察他人的行为并内化相关结果来学习采用社会规范。然而，尽管在青少年时期存在广泛的神经生物学重组和对社会影响的敏感性达到高峰，但对于社会学习发生的潜在神经过程了解甚少。44 名青少年（平均年龄=12.2 岁）在观察他们年龄相差不超过 4 岁的哥哥或姐姐（平均年龄=14.3 岁）完成一项风险决策任务时，完成了 fMRI 扫描。使用群组迭代多模型估计（GIMME）来检查支持社会学习的定向脑区连接模式。我们确定了社会观察的大脑区域连接的群体水平神经通路，包括前岛叶到前扣带皮层和心理化区域到社会认知区域。我们还根据青少年对社会学习的敏感性，通过年龄、性别、模仿、区分和行为，发现了基于神经状态的社会学习。在冒险行为中，更有可能受到影响的青少年会引起神经上调，而不太可能受到社会影响的青少年会引起神经下调。这些发现突出了青少年在突出影响者冒险时处理信息的模式，以及依赖于与社会学习理论相关的相似性因素的显著神经通路。
