Neurobiology of Social Behavior

作为社会群体的一部分，会产生需要专门的行为和神经生物学反应的需求。新近定义的社会神经科学领域旨在理解社会行为的神经生物学基础。我和我的学生的研究计划将重点放在哺乳动物社会行为认知方面的神经生物学上。在社会行为的许多方面中，我们将特别强调那些需要高度认知参与的方面。特别是，使用啮齿动物，我们将重点放在：(1)社会识别，识别个体的能力。这种特定的学习形式对许多社会行为都有影响，从交配和社会偏好到识别和避免被寄生的个体。(2)社会学习，即一个人从其他人那里获得与生物相关的适应性信息，使人能够避免通常与个人学习相关的成本。尽管它在许多物种中具有高度的适应性和共性，但目前对社会学习的神经生物学基础的了解极其有限。(3)社会反应性，即动物在其同类成员在场时的行为反应。我们将通过观察相互关联的大脑系统，将我们对社会行为的神经生物学的研究推向下一个层次，这些系统的活动受性激素的精心调控。通过行为、药理学、神经生物学、分子和遗传学研究方法的综合运用，我们将把基本大脑系统的功能与复杂的社会认知联系起来。通过建立在我们之前和当前研究的基础上，拟议的研究将填补我们对社会大脑理解的一个非常重要的空白，并将有助于推动加拿大社会神经科学的研究。

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.