1-081 - Social Evaluation and Rejection: Biological, Developmental, and Individual Differences

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Social evaluation and rejection are important contexts for understanding socioemotional development and psychopathology. In this symposium, we examine biological correlates of social rejection and evaluation through central and autonomic measures, including fMRI, EEG, and ECG, and questions that span development and heritability. Moreover, we address whether some people are more vulnerable to social rejection and evaluation by examining shy and clinically socially anxious individuals who are sensitive to social threats and fear negative evaluation across age, from childhood to adulthood.
The first study examines theta oscillatory EEG activity to social rejection and describes differences in this neural pattern across children, adolescents, and adults, as well as variation in shyness. The second study emphasizes that avoiding those who are socially rejecting could bring relief in real-life settings, and uses fMRI to show that nodes in neural reward circuits are recruited when people escape from social rejection. The third study uses a longitudinal design to examine children’s shyness and heart rate variability during social evaluation and later internalizing problems. Findings show that high shyness and low heart rate variability are related to higher internalizing problems. The final study uses a family design to examine heritability and endophenotypes of behavioral and brain responses to social evaluation in patients diagnosed with social anxiety disorder and their relatives. Findings show that a negative bias toward predicting social rejection is heritable and theta oscillatory EEG activity will be revisited. Together, these findings capture biological, developmental, and individual differences, which may have implications for promoting healthy development.

Sub Unit

• Social Relationships

Chairs

• Alva Tang, McMaster University

• Louis Schmidt, McMaster University

Individual Presentations

• Personality and Age-related Differences in Theta Oscillations to Social Rejection in Children, Adolescents, and Young Adults - Presenting Author: Alva Tang, McMaster University; Ayelet Lahat, McMaster University; Jia Wu, Yale University; Michael J. Crowley, Yale Child Study Center; Louis Schmidt, McMaster University

• The Great Escape: Intentional Termination of Social Exclusion Engages Reward Circuitry - Presenting Author: Michael J. Crowley, Yale Child Study Center; Daniel Yang, Children’s National Medical Center, Washington, DC

• Shy Temperament Moderates the Link Between Children's Psychophysiological Response to Peer Evaluation and Internalizing Problems - Presenting Author: Amanda E Guyer, University of California, Davis; Natalie R. Troxel, University of California, Davis; Sarah Kahle, University of California, Davis; Jonas G Miller, University of California, Davis; Koraly Perez-Edgar, The Pennsylvania State University; Paul David Hastings, University of California, Davis

• Behavioral and Electrocortical Mechanisms of Social Evaluation in Families with Social Anxiety Disorder - Presenting Author: Anita Harrewijn, Leiden University; Melle van der Molen, Leiden University; Michiel Westenberg, Leiden University