Within-network brain connectivity during a social optimism task is related to personal optimism and optimism for in-group members.

Optimism bias is the tendency to believe desirable events are more likely to happen than undesirable ones. People often display optimistic biases for themselves (personal optimism), but also for members of groups they like or identify with (social optimism). However, the neural bases of and connections between these two concepts are poorly understood. The present study hence used both questionnaires and a social optimism task performed during magnetic resonance imaging to investigate how network connectivity associates with personal and social optimism biases. Using sparse canonical correlation analysis, we found that a behavioral dimension that included both in-group optimism bias and personal optimism bias was positively associated with a dimension of network connectivity. This dimension comprised two networks with positive weights (dorsal precuneus-related default mode network and dorsal sensorimotor network), and three with negative weights (including parts of the salience and central executive networks). Our findings indicate that connectivity in networks adjacent to the temporoparietal junction favors propagation of both personal and social optimism biases. Meanwhile, low connectivity in more frontal networks associated with more complex cognition may also further such propagation.

Predictive modeling of optimism bias using gray matter cortical thickness.

People have been shown to be optimistically biased when their future outcome expectancies are assessed. In fact, we display optimism bias (OB) toward our own success when compared to a rival individual's (personal OB [POB]). Similarly, success expectancies for social groups we like reliably exceed those we mention for a rival group (social OB [SOB]). Recent findings suggest the existence of neural underpinnings for OB. Mostly using structural/functional MRI, these findings rely on voxel-based mass-univariate analyses. While these results remain associative in nature, an open question abides whether MRI information can accurately predict OB. In this study, we hence used predictive modelling to forecast the two OBs. The biases were quantified using a validated soccer paradigm, where personal (self versus rival) and social (in-group versus out-group) forms of OB were extracted at the participant level. Later, using gray matter cortical thickness, we predicted POB and SOB via machine-learning. Our model explained 17% variance (R2 = 0.17) in individual variability for POB (but not SOB). Key predictors involved the rostral-caudal anterior cingulate cortex, pars orbitalis and entorhinal cortex-areas that have been associated with OB before. We need such predictive models on a larger scale, to help us better understand positive psychology and individual well-being.

Optimism bias and its relation to scenario valence, gender, sociality, and insecure attachment.

Optimism bias refers to the tendency to display unjustified high/low expectations of future positive/negative events. This study asked 202 participants to estimate the likelihood of 96 different events. We investigated optimism biases for both oneself and the general population, and how these biases are influenced by gender, valence of the event, sociality of the event, as well as attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance. We found that sociality interacted with gender, with the difference in optimism bias for social vs. alone events being larger among women than among men. Attachment anxiety mainly reduced the optimism bias among men deliberating over future alone situations, while attachment avoidance primarily reduced optimism bias among female respondents deliberating over future social interactions. These results may have implications for the well-being and motivation of differently attached men and women and ultimately inspire psychotherapy interventions.

Sociality of future outcomes moderates the effects of warmth and competence on social optimism bias.

People are overoptimistic about the future of those they like or admire (social optimism bias), expecting significantly more desirable than undesirable outcomes. By contrast, they are pessimistic about those they don't like. To operationalize the (dis)like of social targets, warmth and competence are used as two universal dimensions of social perception. In this pre-registered study, we replicate previous findings while adding two new levels of complexity. First, we make the distinction between the sociality of future outcomes: "alone" outcomes (e.g., enjoying a quiet afternoon by oneself) and "social" outcomes (e.g., enjoying a vacation with the significant other). Second, we investigate the effect of attachment styles on one's expectations for alone and social outcomes toward the social targets. In line with our hypotheses, the sociality of outcomes moderates both the additive and the multiplicative effects of the perceived warmth and competence of social targets on social optimism bias. Diverging from our hypotheses, we find that attachment anxiety and avoidance do not influence the effects of warmth and competence on social optimism bias. However, exploratory analyses reveal that attachment dimensions buffer the magnitude of social optimism bias for highly self-relevant social targets but do not impact social pessimism bias for irrelevant targets.

Brain Structure and Optimism Bias: A Voxel-Based Morphometry Approach.

Individuals often anticipate an unrealistically favorable future for themselves (personal optimism bias) or others (social optimism bias). While such biases are well established, little is known about their neuroanatomy. In this study, participants engaged in a soccer task and estimated the likelihood of successful passes in personal and social scenarios. Voxel-based morphometry revealed that personal optimism bias varied as a positive function of gray matter volume (GMV) in the putamen, frontal pole, hippocampus, temporal pole, inferior temporal gyrus, visual association areas, and mid-superior temporal gyrus. Social optimism bias correlated positively with GMV in the temporoparietal junction and negatively with GMV in the inferior temporal gyrus and pre-supplementary motor areas. Together, these findings suggest that parts of our optimistic outlook are biologically rooted. Moreover, while the two biases looked similar at the behavioral level, they were related to distinct gray matter structures, proposing that their underlying mechanisms are not identical.

Whole-brain white matter correlates of personality profiles predictive of subjective well-being.

We investigated the white matter correlates of personality profiles predictive of subjective well-being. Using principal component analysis to first determine the possible personality profiles onto which core personality measures would load, we subsequently searched for whole-brain white matter correlations with these profiles. We found three personality profiles that correlated with the integrity of white matter tracts. The correlates of an "optimistic" personality profile suggest (a) an intricate network for self-referential processing that helps regulate negative affect and maintain a positive outlook on life, (b) a sustained capacity for visually tracking rewards in the environment and (c) a motor readiness to act upon the conviction that desired rewards are imminent. The correlates of a "short-term approach behavior" profile was indicative of minimal loss of integrity in white matter tracts supportive of lifting certain behavioral barriers, possibly allowing individuals to act more outgoing and carefree in approaching people and rewards. Lastly, a "long-term approach behavior" profile's association with white matter tracts suggests lowered sensitivity to transient updates of stimulus-based associations of rewards and setbacks, thus facilitating the successful long-term pursuit of goals. Together, our findings yield convincing evidence that subjective well-being has its manifestations in the brain.

Enhanced sensitivity to optimistic cues is manifested in brain structure: a voxel-based morphometry study.

Recent research shows that congruent outcomes are more rapidly (and incongruent less rapidly) detected when individuals receive optimistic rather than pessimistic cues, an effect that was termed optimism robustness. In the current voxel-based morphometry study, we examined whether optimism robustness has a counterpart in the brain structure. The participants' task was to detect two different letters (symbolizing monetary gain or loss) in a visual search matrix. Prior to each onset of the search matrix, two different verbal cues informed our participants about a high probability to gain (optimistic expectancy) or lose (pessimistic expectancy) money. The target presented was either congruent or incongruent with these induced expectancies. Optimism robustness revealed in the participants' reaction times correlated positively with gray matter volume (GMV) in brain regions involved in selective attention (medial visual association area, intraparietal sulcus), emphasizing the strong intertwinement of optimistic expectancies and attention deployment. In addition, GMV in the primary visual cortex diminished with increasing optimism robustness, in line with the interpretation of optimism robustness arising from a global, context-oriented perception. Future studies should address the malleability of these structural correlates of optimism robustness. Our results may assist in the identification of treatment targets in depression.

Reduced network integration in default mode and executive networks is associated with social and personal optimism biases.

An optimism bias refers to the belief in good things happening to oneself in the future with a higher likelihood than is justified. Social optimism biases extend this concept to groups that one identifies with. Previous literature has found that both personal and social optimism biases are linked to brain structure and task-related brain function. Less is known about whether optimism biases are also expressed in resting-state functional connectivity (RSFC). Forty-two participants completed questionnaires on dispositional personal optimism (which is not necessarily unjustified) and comparative optimism (i.e., whether we see our own future as being rosier than a comparison person's future) and underwent a resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging scan. They further undertook an imaginative soccer task in order to assess both their personal and social optimism bias. We tested associations of these data with RSFC within and between 13 networks, using sparse canonical correlation analyses (sCCAs). We found that the primary sCCA component was positively connected to personal and social optimism bias and negatively connected to dispositional personal pessimism. This component was associated with (a) reduced integration of the default mode network, (b) reduced integration of the central executive and salience networks, and (c) reduced segregation between the default mode network and the central executive network. Our finding that optimism biases are linked to RSFC indicates that they may be rooted in neurobiology that exists outside of concurrent tasks. This poses questions as to what the limits of the malleability of such biases may be.

Empathic responses to social targets: The influence of warmth and competence perceptions, situational valence, and social identification.

Accounts of empathy distinguish between cognitive (attribution of mental states to a social target) and emotional (sharing of emotions with a social target) empathy. To date, however, little is known about whether and how (interactions between) person perceptions, situational characteristics, and the observer-target relationship affect these constructs. The current study hence investigated (a) how the perceived warmth and competence of different social targets relate to both types of empathy, (b) whether there are differences in empathic responding to positive vs. negative scenarios, and (c) the impact of identification with the social targets. Eighty-nine participants rated cognitive and emotional empathy regarding four stereotypical target characters (student, elderly person, businessperson, alcoholic person) facing diverse positive and negative events. They also rated how warm and competent these characters appeared to them and how strongly they identified with the social targets. Results for cognitive and emotional empathy were partly overlapping, but demonstrated several significant differences, thereby demonstrating the need to investigate the two concepts separately. Notably, stereotypes of warmth predicted both cognitive and emotional empathic responses more strongly in desirable than in undesirable scenarios, which may relate to greater freedom of response to positive (rather than negative) social outcomes permitted by society. Our data show that scenario valence mattered even more for cognitive (than for emotional) empathy because it additionally moderated the effects of perceived competence and social identification. Finally, both cognitive and emotional empathy increased as a positive function of social identification, and social identification moderated effects exerted by perceived warmth and competence (yet differently for the two types of empathy investigated). Together, these findings speak to empathic responses arising from a complex interplay between perceptions (i.e., warmth and competence), scenario valence, and social identification.

Social optimism biases are associated with cortical thickness.

Optimism biases denote the tendency to see future desirable events as being more likely to happen to oneself than undesirable events. Such biases are important for mental health and may extend to other individuals or social groups (social optimism biases). However, little is known about whether social optimism biases relate to brain structure. Using sparse canonical correlation analysis, we associated cortical thickness (assessed by magnetic resonance imaging) with measures of social and personal optimism bias, trait optimism and related concepts. We identified a defensive self-enhancement dimension that associated significantly and reliably with the cortical thickness of the insula and inferior frontal cortex. This self-enhancement dimension included unfavorable biases toward unpopular out-groups and indicators of personal optimism and pessimism. A shared biological substrate underlying future expectancies that subserves the promotion of the self and the denigration of unpopular out-groups may render society-wide efforts to counteract stereotyping particularly difficult: such efforts may hinder the establishment of adaptive personal optimism biases.

Group membership dictates the neural correlates of social optimism biases.

Optimism bias, i.e. expecting the future to hold more desirable than undesirable outcomes, also extends to people that we like or admire. However, it remains unknown how the brain generates this social optimism bias. In this study, respondents estimated the likelihood of future desirable and undesirable outcomes for an in-group and three out-groups: warm-incompetent, cold-competent, and cold-incompetent. We found a strong social optimism bias for the in-group and the warm out-group and an inverted pattern for the cold-incompetent out-group. For all groups, scores of social optimism bias correlated with the brain activity in structures that respondents differentially engaged depending on the target social group. In line with our hypotheses, evaluating the in-group recruited the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and the precuneus/posterior cingulate cortex, whereas evaluating the warm out-group engaged the posterior insula, mid cingulate cortex, and somatosensory cortices. These findings suggest different underlying cognitive mechanisms of social optimism bias for these groups, despite similar behavioural patterns. Thinking about the cold out-groups recruited the right anterior temporal lobe, and temporoparietal junction. Evaluating the cold-incompetent out-group additionally recruited the anterior insula, inferior frontal cortex and dorsomedial frontal cortex. We discuss these neuroimaging findings with respect to their putative cognitive functions.

A neurocognitive model of perceptual decision-making on emotional signals.

Humans make various kinds of decisions about which emotions they perceive from others. Although it might seem like a split-second phenomenon, deliberating over which emotions we perceive unfolds across several stages of decisional processing. Neurocognitive models of general perception postulate that our brain first extracts sensory information about the world then integrates these data into a percept and lastly interprets it. The aim of the present study was to build an evidence-based neurocognitive model of perceptual decision-making on others' emotions. We conducted a series of meta-analyses of neuroimaging data spanning 30 years on the explicit evaluations of others' emotional expressions. We find that emotion perception is rather an umbrella term for various perception paradigms, each with distinct neural structures that underline task-related cognitive demands. Furthermore, the left amygdala was responsive across all classes of decisional paradigms, regardless of task-related demands. Based on these observations, we propose a neurocognitive model that outlines the information flow in the brain needed for a successful evaluation of and decisions on other individuals' emotions. HIGHLIGHTS: Emotion classification involves heterogeneous perception and decision-making tasks Decision-making processes on emotions rarely covered by existing emotions theories We propose an evidence-based neuro-cognitive model of decision-making on emotions Bilateral brain processes for nonverbal decisions, left brain processes for verbal decisions Left amygdala involved in any kind of decision on emotions.

Warmth and competence predict overoptimistic beliefs for out-group but not in-group members.

People can be overly optimistic not only about their own future but also for the people with whom they identify. Furthermore, interpersonal perception generally forms along two universal dimensions, i.e. warmth and competence. In this study, we created four fictional characters that would map onto each quadrant of the two-dimensional space of warmth and competence, i.e. one in-group member (high on both warmth and competence) and three out-group members (high warmth, low competence; high competence, low warmth; low on both warmth and competence). We then asked respondents to assess the likelihood of each character experiencing a series of identical desirable and undesirable events in order to uncover potential optimistic biases. Our study had two goals. First, we wanted to balance the target desirable and undesirable events on four key characteristics, i.e. event frequency, controllability, emotional intensity and personal experience with the event. Second, we wanted to investigate whether stereotypes of warmth and competence could influence the respondents' likelihood estimates for each character. We show that respondents manifested a strong desirability bias, expecting more desirable than undesirable events for the in-group member and the reverse pattern for the extreme out-group member. More important, we show that, within desirable and undesirable events, respondents anchored their judgments for the in-group member on their personal experience with the target events, further revealing an egocentric bias, but turned to stereotypical knowledge in the form of warmth and competence to judge out-group members. Implications for both social perception and optimism research are discussed.

Biased and unbiased perceptual decision-making on vocal emotions.

Perceptual decision-making on emotions involves gathering sensory information about the affective state of another person and forming a decision on the likelihood of a particular state. These perceptual decisions can be of varying complexity as determined by different contexts. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging and a region of interest approach to investigate the brain activation and functional connectivity behind two forms of perceptual decision-making. More complex unbiased decisions on affective voices recruited an extended bilateral network consisting of the posterior inferior frontal cortex, the orbitofrontal cortex, the amygdala, and voice-sensitive areas in the auditory cortex. Less complex biased decisions on affective voices distinctly recruited the right mid inferior frontal cortex, pointing to a functional distinction in this region following decisional requirements. Furthermore, task-induced neural connectivity revealed stronger connections between these frontal, auditory, and limbic regions during unbiased relative to biased decision-making on affective voices. Together, the data shows that different types of perceptual decision-making on auditory emotions have distinct patterns of activations and functional coupling that follow the decisional strategies and cognitive mechanisms involved during these perceptual decisions.

Perceiving emotional expressions in others: Activation likelihood estimation meta-analyses of explicit evaluation, passive perception and incidental perception of emotions.

We conducted a series of activation likelihood estimation (ALE) meta-analyses to determine the commonalities and distinctions between separate levels of emotion perception, namely incidental perception, passive perception, and explicit evaluation of emotional expressions. Pooling together more than 180 neuroimaging experiments using facial, vocal or body expressions, our results are threefold. First, explicitly evaluating the emotions of others recruits brain regions associated with the sensory processing of expressions, such as the inferior occipital gyrus, middle fusiform gyrus and the superior temporal gyrus, and brain regions involved in low-level and high-level mindreading, namely the posterior superior temporal sulcus, the inferior frontal cortex and dorsomedial frontal cortex. Second, we show that only the sensory regions were also consistently active during the passive perception of emotional expressions. Third, we show that the brain regions involved in mindreading were active during the explicit evaluation of both facial and vocal expressions. We discuss these results in light of the existing literature and conclude by proposing a cognitive model for perceiving and evaluating the emotions of others.