Neurobiology of Social Behavior

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Being part of a social group creates needs that require specialized behavioral and neurobiological responses. The novel and recently defined field of social neuroscience aims at understanding the neurobiological bases of social behavior. My and my students' research program will focus on the neurobiology of cognitive aspects of social behavior in mammals. Among many facets of social behavior, we will place particular emphasis on those that require a high level of cognitive involvement. In particular, using rodents, we will focus on: (1) Social Recognition, the ability to recognize individuals. This specific form of learning has implications for a number of social behaviors, from mating and social preferences to the recognition and avoidance of parasitized individuals. (2) Social Learning, whereby an individual acquires biologically relevant and adaptive information from other individuals, allows one to avoid the costs often associated with individual learning. Despite its high adaptiveness and commonality in numerous species, the understanding of the neurobiological bases of social learning is, at present, extremely limited. (3) Social Reactivity, the behavioral responses of animals when in the presence of members of their own species. We will move our investigations on the neurobiology of social behavior to the next level by looking at the interconnected brain systems whose action is under the orchestrating regulation by the sex hormones. Through the integrative use of behavioral, pharmacological, neurobiological, molecular and genetic research methodologies we will link the functioning of basic brain systems to complex social cognition. By building upon our previous and current investigations the proposed research will fill a very significant gap in our understanding of the social brain and will help advance research in social neuroscience in Canada.