Neural Representation of Learning Social Interactions in Non-Human Primates

非人类灵长类动物学习社交互动的神经表征

• 批准号: 10386709
• 负责人: Melissa C Franch
• 金额: $ 3.42万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS HLTH SCI CTR HOUSTON
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2022-07-01 至 2024-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10386709
• 关键词: Address; Affect; Animal Behavior; Animals; Area; Behavior; Behavioral; Brain; Brain region; Communication; Complex; Cues; Data; Decision Making; Environment; Event; Evolution; Experimental Designs; Eye; Feedback; Food; Head; Health; Human; Impairment; Individual; Intelligence; Investigation; Laboratories; Learning; Measures; Mental Depression; Mental Health; Mental disorders; Methods; Monkeys; Motivation; Neurons; Performance; Population; Prefrontal Cortex; Primates; Probability; Process; Research; Rewards; Role; Shapes; Signal Transduction; Social Behavior; Social Concepts; Social Interaction; Structure; Testing; Texture; Therapeutic Intervention; Time; Visual; Visual Cortex; Visual Pathways; area V4; artificial neural network; autism spectrum disorder; base; body language; driving force; experimental study; extrastriate visual cortex; high reward; improved; neural correlate; neural network; neuromechanism; neurophysiology; neuropsychiatric disorder; nonhuman primate; novel; novel strategies; prevent; relating to nervous system; response; sample fixation; social; social cognition; social cooperation; social deficits; social learning; support vector machine; targeted treatment; visual information; visual processing; visual tracking; wireless

Project Summary/Abstract. Visually guided social behavior, specifically cooperation, is one of the primary forces driving the evolution of intelligence and is critical to the health and survival of our species. Like humans, non-human primates also cooperate in natural and laboratory environments. Recent studies in the field of primate social neurophysiology show that neurons in different brain regions can encode socially relevant variables, such as reward and actions of self and other. However, cortical areas have not been studied simultaneously during social interaction, and therefore neural network computations of social cognition are not well understood. Furthermore, the neural correlates of learning advanced social concepts, such as cooperation, have not been studied and remain unknown. A major limitation preventing our understanding of the neural underpinnings of social cognition is the lack of a suitable framework to allow us to study how it emerges in real time from interactions among brain networks. Traditionally, examining the neural bases of social behavior in non-human primates has been performed using stationary experiments in a laboratory environment in which the head and body are restrained. However, it has become increasingly understood that studying the brain in spatially confined, artificial laboratory rigs poses severe limits on our capacity to understand the function of brain circuits. To overcome these limitations, I propose a novel approach using high-yield wireless neural recordings and eye tracking to study the cortical dynamics of social interactions across multiple cortical areas involved in processing visual information (mid-level visual cortex V4) and decision making (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) while two freely moving monkeys learn to cooperate for food reward. I hypothesize that learning social interactions will induce changes in 1) the encoding of socially relevant variables such as social visual cues and choice in each area and 2) functional connectivity between areas. To investigate this hypothesis, I will record animals' behaviors (Aim 1), and eye data and neural activity (Aim 2-3) simultaneously as they learn to cooperate under different conditions. While learning cooperation, I expect animal behaviors, such as the coordination of their actions, to improve (Aim 1). I also predict animal behaviors will be sensitive to reward value and fairness, showing less motivation to cooperate for small or unequal rewards, but will improve with learning (Aim 1). I anticipate the discovery of neural computations underlying social cognition within (Aim 2) and between brain areas (Aim 3) and that neural encoding of salient information, such as social visual cues and actions, will improve as animals learn to cooperate. This project provides a novel method and use of analyses to study learning social interactions. This research will further our understanding of the social brain by elucidating the role of neural networks underlying social cognition. Most importantly, the results of this investigation will provide long-term candidate brain areas and behaviors that can be targeted for therapeutic intervention in individuals suffering from social dysfunction.

项目摘要/摘要。视觉引导的社会行为，特别是合作，是主要的之一 推动智力演变的力量，对我们物种的健康和生存至关重要。像人类一样 非人类灵长类动物也在自然和实验室环境中合作。灵长类动物领域的最新研究 社会神经生理学表明，不同大脑区域的神经元可以编码与社会相关的变量，例如 作为自我和他人的奖励和行动。但是，皮质区域尚未同时研究 社会互动，因此对社会认知的神经网络计算尚不清楚。 此外，学习高级社会概念（例如合作）的神经相关性并非 研究并保持未知。一个主要限制，阻止了我们对神经基础的理解 社会认知缺乏合适的框架，使我们能够实时研究它的实时出现 大脑网络之间的相互作用。传统上，检查非人类社会行为的神经基础 灵长类动物是在实验室环境中使用固定实验进行的。 身体受到约束。但是，已经越来越了解，在空间上研究大脑 狭窄的人工实验室钻机对我们了解脑电路功能的能力构成了严重的限制。 为了克服这些局限性，我提出了一种使用高收益无线神经记录和眼睛的新方法 跟踪研究涉及处理的多个皮质区域的社会互动的皮质动态 视觉信息（中级视觉皮层V4）和决策（背外侧前额叶皮层），而两个 自由移动的猴子学会合作获得食物奖励。我假设学习社交互动将 诱导1）编码社会相关变量的编码，例如社交视觉提示和每个选择 面积和2）区域之间的功能连接。为了调查这一假设，我将记录动物的行为 （AIM 1），眼睛数据和神经活动（AIM 2-3）同时学会在不同的地方合作 状况。在学习合作时，我期望动物行为，例如其行为的协调， 改进（目标1）。我还预测，动物行为对奖励价值和公平性很敏感，显示较少 为小额或不平等的奖励合作的动机，但会随着学习而有所改善（AIM 1）。我期待的 发现（AIM 2）和大脑区域之间（AIM 3）和 随着动物学习 合作。该项目提供了一种新颖的方法，并使用分析来研究学习社交互动。 这项研究将通过阐明神经网络的作用来进一步了解社会大脑 基本的社会认知。最重要的是，这项调查的结果将为长期候选人提供 大脑区域和行为，可以针对患有社会的个体的治疗干预 功能障碍。