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Oxytocin enhances the pain-relieving effects of social support in romantic couples.

ABSTRACT: Social support plays a vital role in physical and mental well-being. The neuropeptide hormone oxytocin (OXT) has been implicated in modulating pair-bonding and affiliative behaviors, but whether OXT contributes to the analgesic effects of a romantic partner's touch remains elusive. In the present randomized placebo-controlled, between-group, functional magnetic resonance imaging study involving 194 healthy volunteers (97 heterosexual couples), we tested the effects of intranasal OXT (24?IU) on handholding as a common mode of expressing emotional support in romantic couples. We scanned the subjects while brief electric shocks were administered. The subjects assumed that they received social support from either their romantic partner or an unfamiliar person. Unbeknown to the subject, in the partner and stranger support conditions, the same male experimenter always held the subject's left hand. Partner support was most effective in reducing the unpleasantness of electric shocks, and OXT further attenuated the unpleasantness across conditions. On the neural level, OXT significantly augmented the beneficial effects of partner support, as evidenced by a stronger decrease of neural responses to shocks in the anterior insula (AI), a stronger activity increase in the middle frontal gyrus (MFG), and a strengthened functional coupling between the AI and MFG. Our results support the notion that OXT specifically modulates the beneficial effects of social support in romantic couples by concomitantly reducing pain-associated activity and increasing activity linked to cognitive control and pain inhibition. We hypothesize that impaired OXT signaling may contribute to the experience of a lack of partner support.

SUBMITTER: Kreuder AK

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6865468 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Oxytocin enhances the pain-relieving effects of social support in romantic couples.

Kreuder Ann-Kathrin AK Wassermann Lea L Wollseifer Michael M Ditzen Beate B Eckstein Monika M Stoffel-Wagner Birgit B Hennig Juergen J Hurlemann René R Scheele Dirk D

Human brain mapping 20180828 1

Social support plays a vital role in physical and mental well-being. The neuropeptide hormone oxytocin (OXT) has been implicated in modulating pair-bonding and affiliative behaviors, but whether OXT contributes to the analgesic effects of a romantic partner's touch remains elusive. In the present randomized placebo-controlled, between-group, functional magnetic resonance imaging study involving 194 healthy volunteers (97 heterosexual couples), we tested the effects of intranasal OXT (24 IU) on h ...[more]

PMID: 30152573

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Project description:Individuals with schizophrenia have functionally significant deficits in automatic and controlled social cognition, but no currently available pharmacologic treatments reduce these deficits. The neuropeptide oxytocin has multiple prosocial effects when administered intranasally in humans and there is growing interest in its therapeutic potential in schizophrenia.We administered 40 IU of oxytocin and saline placebo intranasally to 29 male subjects with schizophrenia and 31 age-matched, healthy controls in a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, cross-over study. Social cognition was assessed with The Awareness of Social Inference Test (TASIT) and the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET). We examined the effects of oxytocin administration on automatic social cognition (the ability to rapidly interpret and understand emotional cues from the voice, face, and body); controlled social cognition (the ability to comprehend indirectly expressed emotions, thoughts, and intentions through complex deliberations over longer time periods); and a control task (the ability to comprehend truthful dialog and perform general task procedures) in individuals with and without schizophrenia using mixed factorial analysis of variance models.Patients with schizophrenia showed significant impairments in automatic and controlled social cognition compared to healthy controls, and administration of oxytocin significantly improved their controlled, but not automatic, social cognition, F(1, 58)=8.75; p=0.004. Conversely, oxytocin administration had limited effects on social cognition in healthy participants. Patients and controls performed equally well and there were no effects of oxytocin administration on the control task.Intact social cognitive abilities are associated with better functional outcomes in individuals with schizophrenia. Our data highlight the potentially complex effects of oxytocin on some but not all aspects of social cognition, and support the exploration of intranasal oxytocin as a potential adjunct treatment to improve controlled social cognition in schizophrenia.

Dataset Information

Oxytocin enhances the pain-relieving effects of social support in romantic couples.

Publications

Oxytocin enhances the pain-relieving effects of social support in romantic couples.

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