Social neuroscience: challenges and opportunities in the study of complex behavior.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Cacioppo JT
PROVIDER: S-EPMC3098127 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Apr
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Social neuroscience: challenges and opportunities in the study of complex behavior.
Cacioppo John T JT Decety Jean J
Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 20110104
Social species are so characterized because they form organizations that extend beyond the individual. The goal of social neuroscience is to investigate the biological mechanisms that underlie these social structures, processes, and behavior and the influences between social and neural structures and processes. Such an endeavor is challenging because it necessitates the integration of multiple levels. Mapping across systems and levels (from genome to social groups and cultures) requires interdis ...[more]
Similar Datasets
Project description:BackgroundThe concept of digital social prescription usually refers to social prescriptions that are facilitated by using technology. Tools that enable such digital social prescriptions may be beneficial in recommending nonmedical activities to people with mental illness. As these tools are still somewhat novel and emerging, little is known about their potential advantages and disadvantages.ObjectiveThe objective of this study is to identify the potential opportunities and challenges that may arise from digital social prescriptions.MethodsWe developed a qualitative questionnaire that was disseminated through social media (Facebook and Twitter). A purposive sample targeting digital mental health experts and nonexperts was approached. The questionnaire asked participants' views about digital social prescription; the core elements linked with a definition of digital social prescription; and the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats associated with digital social prescription.ResultsFour core elements were recommended to define the concept of digital social prescription: digital, facilitate, user, and social. The main strength identified was the possibility to rapidly start using digital social prescription tools, which were perceived as cost-effective. The main weaknesses were their poor adherence and difficulties with using such tools. The main opportunities were an increased access to social prescription services and the prevention of serious mental illness. The main threats were certain groups being disadvantaged, patients being subject to unintended negative consequences, and issues relating to confidentiality and data protection.ConclusionsAlthough digital social prescriptions may be able to effectively augment the social prescriptions, a careful consideration of practical challenges and data ethics is imperative in the design and implementation of such technologies.
| S-EPMC7988390 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The substantial progress made in the basic sciences of the brain has yet to be adequately translated to successful clinical therapeutics to treat central nervous system (CNS) diseases. Possible explanations include the lack of quantitative and validated biomarkers, the subjective nature of many clinical endpoints, and complex pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic relationships, but also the possibility that highly selective drugs in the CNS do not reflect the complex interactions of different brain circuits. Although computational systems pharmacology modeling designed to capture essential components of complex biological systems has been increasingly accepted in pharmaceutical research and development for oncology, inflammation, and metabolic disorders, the uptake in the CNS field has been very modest. In this article, a cross-disciplinary group with representatives from academia, pharma, regulatory, and funding agencies make the case that the identification and exploitation of CNS therapeutic targets for drug discovery and development can benefit greatly from a system and network approach that can span the gap between molecular pathways and the neuronal circuits that ultimately regulate brain activity and behavior. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), in collaboration with the National Institute on Aging (NIA), National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), and National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), convened a workshop to explore and evaluate the potential of a quantitative systems pharmacology (QSP) approach to CNS drug discovery and development. The objective of the workshop was to identify the challenges and opportunities of QSP as an approach to accelerate drug discovery and development in the field of CNS disorders. In particular, the workshop examined the potential for computational neuroscience to perform QSP-based interrogation of the mechanism of action for CNS diseases, along with a more accurate and comprehensive method for evaluating drug effects and optimizing the design of clinical trials. Following up on an earlier white paper on the use of QSP in general disease mechanism of action and drug discovery, this report focuses on new applications, opportunities, and the accompanying limitations of QSP as an approach to drug development in the CNS therapeutic area based on the discussions in the workshop with various stakeholders.
| S-EPMC6966183 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Dogs and humans have lived together for thousands of years and share many analogous socio-cognitive skills. Dog neuroimaging now provides insight into the neural bases of these shared social abilities. Here, we summarize key findings from dog fMRI identifying neocortical brain areas implicated in visual social cognition, such as face, body, and emotion perception, as well as action observation in dogs. These findings provide converging evidence that the temporal cortex plays a significant role in visual social cognition in dogs. We further briefly review investigations into the neural base of the dog-human relationship, mainly involving limbic brain regions. We then discuss current challenges in the field, such as statistical power and lack of common template spaces, and how to overcome them. Finally, we argue that the foundation has now been built to investigate and compare the neural bases of more complex socio-cognitive phenomena shared by dogs and humans. This will strengthen and expand the role of the domestic dog as a powerful comparative model species and provide novel insights into the evolutionary roots of social cognition.
| S-EPMC7616343 | biostudies-literature
Project description:A physically active lifestyle provides innumerable benefits; yet, few individuals are physically active enough to reap those benefits. Tailored physical activity interventions may address low rates of physical activity by offering individualized strategies that consider a person's characteristics, needs, preferences, and/or context, rather than the traditional one-size-fits-all approach. However, the tailoring methodology is in its nascency, and an understanding of how best to develop such interventions is needed. In this commentary, we identify future directions to enhance the impact of tailored interventions designed to increase physical activity participation. A multi-country collaborative was established to review the literature and discuss an agenda for future research. Two overarching research opportunities are suggested for improving the development of tailored, behavioral physical activity interventions: (a) optimize the engagement of diverse knowledge users in intervention co-design and (b) examine ethical considerations that may impact the use of technology to support tailored physical activity delivery. Specifically, there is a need for better reporting and evaluation of knowledge user involvement alongside targeting diversity in the inclusion of knowledge users. Furthermore, while technology boasts many opportunities to increase the scale and precision of interventions, examinations of how it impacts recipients' experiences of and participation in tailored interventions are needed to ensure the benefits of technology use outweigh the risks. A better understanding of these research areas will help ensure that the diverse needs of individuals are met, technology is appropriately used to support tailoring, and ultimately it improves the effectiveness of tailored physical activity interventions.
| S-EPMC8672936 | biostudies-literature
Project description:In the increasingly popular and diverse research area of social robotics, the primary goal is to develop robot agents that exhibit socially intelligent behaviour while interacting in a face-to-face context with human partners. An important aspect of face-to-face social conversation is fluent, flexible linguistic interaction; face-to-face dialogue is both the basic form of human communication and the richest and most flexible, combining unrestricted verbal expression with meaningful non-verbal acts such as gestures and facial displays, along with instantaneous, continuous collaboration between the speaker and the listener. In practice, however, most developers of social robots tend not to use the full possibilities of the unrestricted verbal expression afforded by face-to-face conversation; instead, they generally tend to employ relatively simplistic processes for choosing the words for their robots to say. This contrasts with the work carried out Natural Language Generation (NLG), the field of computational linguistics devoted to the automated production of high-quality linguistic content; while this research area is also an active one, in general most effort in NLG is focused on producing high-quality written text. This article summarizes the state of the art in the two individual research areas of social robotics and natural language generation. It then discusses the reasons why so few current social robots make use of more sophisticated generation techniques. Finally, an approach is proposed to bringing some aspects of NLG into social robotics, concentrating on techniques and tools that are most appropriate to the needs of socially interactive robots. This article is part of the theme issue 'From social brains to social robots: applying neurocognitive insights to human-robot interaction'.
| S-EPMC6452247 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BACKGROUND:Health promotion is an effective tool for public health. It goes beyond preventing the spread of diseases and reducing the disease burden. It includes interventions encompassing the creation of supportive environments, building public health policy, developing personal skills, reorienting health services and strengthening multisectoral community actions. AIM:The aim of the review was conduct an analysis on the opportunities and challenges of the use of social media for health promotion in South Africa. METHODS:A search of review articles on health promotion using social media conducted using Medline and Google Scholar. Secondary searches were conducted using references and citations from selected articles. RESULTS:Social media has potential of being an effective health promotion tool in South Africa. It presents an opportunity for scaling health promotion programs because of its low cost, its ability to have virtual communities and the ease of access eliminating geographical barriers. It also allows real-time communication between various stakeholders. It allows information to spread far and fast and leaving irrespective of the credibility of the source of information. There is a need to take into account country specific socio-economic issues, which may perpetuate unintended consequences related to the digital divide, data costs and the varying levels of health literacy. CONCLUSION:Considering the opportunities presented by social media, the National Department of Health needs to review its health promotion strategy and include the use of social media as an enabler. They also need to address to explore intersectoral measures to address issues which threatening equitable access to credible health promotion information.
| S-EPMC7433217 | biostudies-literature
Project description:In an era of accelerated health information technology capability, health care organizations increasingly use digital data to predict outcomes such as emergency department use, hospitalizations, and health care costs. This trend occurs alongside a growing recognition that social and behavioral determinants of health (SBDH) influence health and medical care use. Consequently, health providers and insurers are starting to incorporate new SBDH data sources into a wide range of health care prediction models, although existing models that use SBDH variables have not been shown to improve health care predictions more than models that use exclusively clinical variables. In this viewpoint, we review the rationale behind the push to integrate SBDH data into health care predictive models and explore the technical, strategic, and ethical challenges faced as this process unfolds across the United States. We also offer several recommendations to overcome these challenges to reach the promise of SBDH predictive analytics to improve health and reduce health care disparities.
| S-EPMC7509627 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Multisectoral actions for health, defined as actions undertaken by non-health sectors to protect the health of the population, are essential in the context of inter-linkages between three dimensions of sustainable development: economic, social, and environmental. These multisectoral actions can address the social and economic factors that influence the health of a population at the local, national, and global levels. This editorial identifies the challenges, opportunities and capacity development for effective multisectoral actions for health in a complex policy environment. The root causes of the challenges lie in poor governance such as entrenched political and administrative corruption, widespread clientelism, lack of citizen voice, weak social capital, lack of trust and lack of respect for human rights. This is further complicated by the lack of government effectiveness caused by poor capacity for strong public financial management and low levels of transparency and accountability which leads to corruption. The absence of or rapid changes in government policies, and low salary in relation to living standards result in migration out of qualified staff. Tobacco, alcohol and sugary drink industries are major risk factors for non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and had interfered with health policy through regulatory capture and potential law suits against the government. Opportunities still exist. Some World Health Assembly (WHA) and United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolutions are both considered as external driving forces for intersectoral actions for health. In addition, Thailand National Health Assembly under the National Health Act is another tool providing opportunity to form trust among stakeholders from different sectors. Capacity development at individual, institutional and system level to generate evidence and ensure it is used by multisectoral agencies is as critical as strengthening the health literacy of people and the overall good governance of a country.
| S-EPMC5505105 | biostudies-other
Project description:Social neuroscience is rapidly exploring the complex territory between perception and action where recognition, value, and meaning are instantiated. This review follows the trail of research on oxytocin and vasopressin as an exemplar of one path for exploring the "dark matter" of social neuroscience. Studies across vertebrate species suggest that these neuropeptides are important for social cognition, with gender- and steroid-dependent effects. Comparative research in voles yields a model based on interspecies and intraspecies variation of the geography of oxytocin receptors and vasopressin V1a receptors in the forebrain. Highly affiliative species have receptors in brain circuits related to reward or reinforcement. The neuroanatomical distribution of these receptors may be guided by variations in the regulatory regions of their respective genes. This review describes the promises and problems of extrapolating these findings to human social cognition, with specific reference to the social deficits of autism.
| S-EPMC2847497 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Social media is an increasingly popular source of health information, and the rarity and complexity of interstitial lung disease (ILD) may particularly draw patients with ILD to social media for information and support. The objective of this viewpoint is to provide an overview of social media, explore the benefits and limitations of ILD-related social media use, and discuss future development of healthcare information on social media. We describe the value of integrating social media into the practice of ILD health professionals, including its role in information dissemination, patient engagement, knowledge generation, and formation of health policy. We also describe major challenges to expanded social media use in ILD, including limited access for some individuals and populations, abundance of misinformation, and concerns about patient privacy. Finally, for healthcare professionals looking to join social media, we provide practical guidance and considerations to optimize the potential benefits and minimize the potential pitfalls of social media.
| S-EPMC8448389 | biostudies-literature