Neural correlates of social loss during competition

One of the most important factors in the survival of people is to struggle together with the difficulties and threats encountered. The ability to be together and cooperate lies in the fact that the person acts in the interests of the group to which the person belongs and to supported by the group if necessary. Research has shown that there is a strong relationship between social support and health status and life expectancy. Besides the effects of social support on physical health, the effects on psychiatric disorders and mental health, especially depression, are known. Although the strong relationship between social support and health is known, the mechanisms underlying this relationship are not fully known, especially neurocognitive mechanisms have not been discovered to a great extent. Research in this area has focused on the mechanisms underlying social exclusion and no study has been found to examine the neural mechanisms of social support. In this study, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiment was developed by the researchers to determine the effects of social support and social support loss on brain. One volunteer and her three friends joined the social support experiment at the same time. The volunteer was told that a certain amount of points would be shared between her/him and her/his opponent during the test according to her/his and her/his opponent's answers, and that the allocation would be made by three of her/his friends and two of her/his opponent's friends. In order for the volunteer to feel social support, he gained more points in the first stage of the experiment and he lost more in the last stage of the experiment in order to feel that he lost his social support. The participants in the control group completed the experiment by win. Brain function difference between social support earned and social support lost periods was investigated by using Statistical Parametric Mapping (SPM) with general linear model. No active brain region was determined when they gained social support in the experimental and control groups. In the experimental group, insula and anterior cingulate cortex activity were determined in the area where social support was lost. It has been determined that loss of social support leads to activation in regions related to physical pain. Keywords; Social Support; Social Exclusion; Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging