Functional organization of social perception networks in the human brain

• Published in: NeuroImage (Orlando, Fla.) Vol. 272; p. 120025
• Main Authors: Santavirta, Severi, Karjalainen, Tomi, Nazari-Farsani, Sanaz, Hudson, Matthew, Putkinen, Vesa, Seppälä, Kerttu, Sun, Lihua, Glerean, Enrico, Hirvonen, Jussi, Karlsson, Henry K., Nummenmaa, Lauri
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 15.05.2023; Elsevier Limited; Academic Press; Elsevier
• Subjects: Brain; Brain - diagnostic imaging; Brain - physiology; Brain mapping; Brain Mapping - methods; Correlation analysis; fMRI; Functional magnetic resonance imaging; Functional morphology; Humans; Information processing; Intersubject correlation; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Medical imaging; Multivariate pattern analysis; Neuroimaging; Occipital Lobe - physiology; Perception; Social interaction; Social interactions; Social organization; Social Perception; Synchronization; Taxonomy; fMRI; Social perception; Multivariate pattern analysis; Intersubject correlation
• ISSN: 1053-8119; 1095-9572; 1095-9572
• DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2023.120025

•The results establish the perceptual and neural organization of social perception.•Perceived social features can be described in a limited set of main dimensions.•Dynamic social information can be accurately decoded from brain activity•Brain processes social information in a spatially decreasing gradient.•STS, LOTC, TPJ and FG serve as the main hubs for social perception. Humans rapidly extract diverse and complex information from ongoing social interactions, but the perceptual and neural organization of the different aspects of social perception remains unresolved. We showed short movie clips with rich social content to 97 healthy participants while their haemodynamic brain activity was measured with fMRI. The clips were annotated moment-to-moment for a large set of social features and 45 of the features were evaluated reliably between annotators. Cluster analysis of the social features revealed that 13 dimensions were sufficient for describing the social perceptual space. Three different analysis methods were used to map the social perceptual processes in the human brain. Regression analysis mapped regional neural response profiles for different social dimensions. Multivariate pattern analysis then established the spatial specificity of the responses and intersubject correlation analysis connected social perceptual processing with neural synchronization. The results revealed a gradient in the processing of social information in the brain. Posterior temporal and occipital regions were broadly tuned to most social dimensions and the classifier revealed that these responses showed spatial specificity for social dimensions; in contrast Heschl gyri and parietal areas were also broadly associated with different social signals, yet the spatial patterns of responses did not differentiate social dimensions. Frontal and subcortical regions responded only to a limited number of social dimensions and the spatial response patterns did not differentiate social dimension. Altogether these results highlight the distributed nature of social processing in the brain. [Display omitted]