Adolescents' neural response to social reward and real-world emotional closeness and positive affect.

Feeling emotionally close to others during social interactions is a ubiquitous and meaningful experience that can elicit positive affect. The present study integrates functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and ecological momentary assessment (EMA) to investigate whether neural response to social reward (1) is related to the experience of emotional closeness and (2) moderates the association between emotional closeness and positive affect during and following social interactions. In this study, 34 typically developing adolescents (ages 14–18) completed a social reward fMRI task, a monetary reward fMRI task, and a two-week EMA protocol regarding their social and affective experiences. Adolescents with greater right posterior superior temporal sulcus/temporoparietal junction (pSTS/TPJ) response to social reward reported greater mean momentary emotional closeness. Neural response to social reward in the right pSTS/TPJ moderated how strongly momentary emotional closeness was associated with both concurrent positive affect and future peak happiness, but in different ways. Although emotional closeness had a significant positive association with concurrent positive affect among adolescents at both high and low right pSTS/TPJ response based on a follow-up simple slopes test, this association was stronger for adolescents with low right pSTS/TPJ response. In contrast, emotional closeness had a significant positive association with future peak happiness among adolescents with high right pSTS/TPJ response but not among those with low right pSTS/TPJ response. These findings demonstrate the importance of neural response to social reward in key social processing regions for everyday experiences of emotional closeness and positive affect in the context of social interactions.

在社交互动中与他人情感亲近是一种普遍且有意义的体验，能够引发积极的情感。本研究结合功能性磁共振成像（fMRI）和生态瞬时评估（EMA）来探究对社会奖励的神经反应（1）是否与情感亲近的体验相关，以及（2）是否在社交互动期间及之后调节情感亲近与积极情感之间的关联。在这项研究中，34名正常发育的青少年（年龄14 - 18岁）完成了一项社会奖励fMRI任务、一项金钱奖励fMRI任务以及一项为期两周的关于他们社交和情感体验的EMA方案。对社会奖励在右侧后颞上沟/颞顶联合区（pSTS/TPJ）有更强反应的青少年报告的平均瞬时情感亲近程度更高。右侧pSTS/TPJ对社会奖励的神经反应以不同方式调节了瞬时情感亲近与同时产生的积极情感以及未来的峰值幸福之间的关联强度。尽管根据后续的简单斜率检验，在右侧pSTS/TPJ反应高和低的青少年中，情感亲近与同时产生的积极情感都有显著的正相关，但这种关联在右侧pSTS/TPJ反应低的青少年中更强。相比之下，在右侧pSTS/TPJ反应高的青少年中，情感亲近与未来的峰值幸福有显著的正相关，而在右侧pSTS/TPJ反应低的青少年中则没有。这些发现表明，在关键的社会处理区域对社会奖励的神经反应对于社交互动背景下情感亲近和积极情感的日常体验具有重要意义。