Solitude can have destructive consequences on mental and physical health, yet there are currently few behavioral interventions for solitude like there are for other conditions. Lieberz et al. checked out the basis for these two conditions by comparing how people with social anxiety and high and low solitude behaved in a social gaming task.
Amygdala activity was significantly improved throughout the choice stage of the social betting task when participants selected the dangerous alternative with a human partner compared to the computer system partner. Credit: Lieberz et al., JNeurosci 2021
People with social anxiety took the safe bet more often to prevent social feedback from the videos. By determining the participants brain activity during the task with fMRI, the researchers discovered people with social stress and anxiety displayed increased amygdala activation during the decision stage– a sign of increased stress and anxiety– and reduced nucleus accumbens activation during the feedback phase– a sign of minimized social benefit.
Recommendation: “Neural and behavioral dissociation of social anxiety and loneliness” by Jana Lieberz, Simone G. Shamay-Tsoory, Nira Saporta, Alisa Kanterman, Jessica Gorni, Timo Esser, Ekaterina Kuskova, Johannes Schultz, René Hurlemann and Dirk Scheele, 14 February 2022, JNeurosci.DOI: 10.1523/ JNEUROSCI.2029-21.2022.
By Society for Neuroscience
February 18, 2022
Behavioral interventions targeting social stress and anxiety should be adjusted to treat solitude.
Regardless of similar signs, isolation and social anxiety are driven by different brain states, according to brand-new research study released in JNeurosci.
