Prefrontal control of social influence in risk decision making

• Published in: NeuroImage (Orlando, Fla.) Vol. 257; p. 119265
• Main Authors: Lin, Yongling, Gu, Ruolei, Zhou, Jiali, Li, Yiman, Xu, Pengfei, Luo, Yue-jia
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 15.08.2022; Elsevier Limited; Elsevier
• Subjects: Brain mapping; Change of mind; Computational neuroscience; Cortex (cingulate); Cortex (parietal); Decision making; Decision preference; Experiments; Frontal gyrus; Functional magnetic resonance imaging; Individual difference; Information processing; Neuroimaging; Preferences; Prefrontal cortex; Probability; Social influence; Wheels; Social influence; Decision preference; Prefrontal cortex; Individual difference; Change of mind
• ISSN: 1053-8119; 1095-9572
• DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2022.119265

To optimize our decisions, we may change our mind by utilizing social information. Here, we examined how changes of mind were modulated by Social Misalignment Sensitivity (SMS), egocentric tendency, and decision preferences in a decision-making paradigm including both risk and social information. Combining functional magnetic resonance imaging with computational modeling, we showed that both SMS and egocentric tendency modulated changes of mind under the influence of social information. While SMS was represented in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and superior parietal gyrus (SPG) in the socially aligned situation, a distributed brain network was activated in the misaligned condition, including not only the dACC and SPG but also superior frontal gyrus and precuneus. These results suggest that SMS is related to a monitoring brain system, the scope of which varies according to the level of misalignment with social majority. The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex selectively interacted with SMS among the participants with a low switching threshold, indicating that its regulation on SMS may be sensitive to inter-individual variation. Our findings highlight the predominant roles of SMS and the prefrontal control system towards changes of mind under social influence.