Neural mechanism underlying depressive-like state associated with social status loss.

Downward social mobility is a well-known mental risk factor for depression, but its neural mechanism remains elusive. Here, by forcing mice to lose against their subordinates in a non-violent social contest, we lower their social ranks stably and induce depressive-like behaviors. These rank-decline-associated depressive-like behaviors can be reversed by regaining social status. In vivo fiber photometry and single-unit electrophysiological recording show that forced loss, but not natural loss, generates negative reward prediction error (RPE). Through the lateral hypothalamus, the RPE strongly activates the brain's anti-reward center, the lateral habenula (LHb). LHb activation inhibits the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) that controls social competitiveness and reinforces retreats in contests. These results reveal the core neural mechanisms mutually promoting social status loss and depressive behaviors. The intertwined neuronal signaling controlling mPFC and LHb activities provides a mechanistic foundation for the crosstalk between social mobility and psychological disorder, unveiling a promising target for intervention.

The inheritance of social status: England, 1600 to 2022.

A lineage of 422,374 English people (1600 to 2022) contains correlations in social outcomes among relatives as distant as 4th cousins. These correlations show striking patterns. The first is the strong persistence of social status across family trees. Correlations decline by a factor of only 0.79 across each generation. Even fourth cousins, with a common ancestor only five generations earlier, show significant status correlations. The second remarkable feature is that the decline in correlation with genetic distance in the lineage is unchanged from 1600 to 2022. Vast social changes in England between 1600 and 2022 would have been expected to increase social mobility. Yet people in 2022 remain correlated in outcomes with their lineage relatives in exactly the same way as in preindustrial England. The third surprising feature is that the correlations parallel those of a simple model of additive genetic determination of status, with a genetic correlation in marriage of 0.57.

School choice increases racial segregation even when parents do not care about race.

This research examines how school choice impacts school segregation. Specifically, this work demonstrates that even if parents do not take the racial demographics of schools into account, preference differences between Black and White parents for other school attributes can still result in segregation. These preference differences stem from motivational differences in pursuit of social status. Given that the de facto US racial hierarchy assigns Black people to a lower social status, Black parents are more motivated to seek schools that signal that they can improve their children's status. Simulations of parental school decisions at scale show that preference differences under an unmitigated school-choice policy lead to more segregated schools, impacting more than half a million US children for every 3-percentage-point increase in school-choice availability. In contrast, if Black and White parents have similar preferences, unmitigated school choice would reduce racial segregation. This research may inform public policy concerning school choice and school segregation.

German questionnaires assessing quality of life and psycho-social status in people with epilepsy: Reliable change and intercorrelations.

OBJECTIVES: People with epilepsy (PWE) not only suffer from seizures but also from various psycho-social issues containing facets such as social functioning, anxiety, depression or stigmatization, and consequently quality of life. (1) Assessing reliable change of these issues is crucial to evaluate their course and potential treatment effects. As most psycho-social self-report questionnaires have been validated in separate samples, their clinical-socio-demographic differences may limit the comparability and generalizability of the scales' internal consistency, which is important for the reliable change index (RCI). Using a co-normalized approach, we provide the internal consistency and RCIs for a large set of questionnaires targeting quality of life (QOLIE-31-P), depressive symptoms (NDDI-E), anxiety (GAD-7), seizure severity (LSSS), subjective antiseizure medication adverse events (LAEP), stigma, epilepsy-related fear, and restrictions in daily life (PESOS), and subjective cognition (FLei). As for some German versions of these measures, psychometric data is still missing, we also add important information for the German language area. (2) In addition, knowledge about intercorrelations of these constructs is needed to shape questionnaire usage and treatment approaches. We thus investigate associations of these scales and compare weighted and unweighted subscales of the QOLIE-31-P. METHODS: In our prospective study, 202 adult in-patients of the Epilepsy-Center Berlin-Brandenburg with a reliable diagnosis of epilepsy filled out a set of self-report questionnaires between 03/2018 and 03/2021. We calculated Cronbach's α, RCIs, and bivariate intercorrelations and compared the respective correlations of weighted and unweighted scales of the QOLIE-31-P. RESULTS: For most of the scales, good to excellent internal consistency was identified. Furthermore, we found intercorrelations in the expected directions with strong links between scales assessing similar constructs (e.g., QOLIE-31-P Cognition and FLei), but weak relationships between measures for different constructs (e.g., QOLIE-31-P Seizure worry and FLei). The QOLIE-31-P Total score was highly correlated with most of the other scales. Some differences regarding their correlational patterns for weighted and unweighted QOLIE-31-P scales were identified. CONCLUSIONS: Psycho-social constructs share a large amount of common variance, but still can be separated from each other. The QOLIE-31-P Total score represents an adequate measure of general psycho-social burden.

Social acceptance, emissions analysis and potential applications of paper-waste briquettes in Andean areas.

The research assessed waste-based briquettes consumption compared to conventional fuels in the Andes. Laboratory tests were conducted together with on-field analysis in Colquencha (Bolivia). The laboratory study shows that the performances of briquettes are better in terms of PM2.5 (933.4 ± 50.8 mg kg-1) and CO emissions (22.89 ± 2.40 g kg-1) compared to animal dung (6265.7 ± 1273.5 mgPM2.5 kg-1 and 48.10 ± 12.50 gCO kg-1), although the boiling time increased due to the lower fuel consumption rate and firepower compared to shrubs. The social survey organized with 150 Bolivian citizens suggested that low-income households are not able to pay for an alternative fuel: about 40% would pay less than 4 USD per month, while methane use for cooking is positively correlated with the income level (r = 0.244, p < 0.05). On field analysis suggested that local cookstoves are not appropriate for briquettes combustion since indoor air pollution overcomes 30 ppm of CO and 10 mgPM2.5 m-3. On balance, local small manufactures can be the main target for selling waste-based briquettes to reduce shrubs and wood consumption. However, briquettes production costs seem not yet competitive to natural easy-to-obtain fuels (i.e., animal dung). The research encourages the use of cellulosic and biomass waste-based briquettes in the Andean area for cooking, heating, or manufacturing and strongly advises policy-makers to introduce economic incentives for the recovery of secondary raw materials.

Exploring discrimination, social acceptance, and its impact on the psychological well-being of older men who have sex with men: A cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: The exploration of discrimination, social acceptance, and their impact on the psychological well-being of older men who have sex with men (MSM) is a critical area of study within the broader field of LGBTQ+ research. This demographic, comprising individuals who identify as both male and homosexual and are aged in the older spectrum of the population, faces unique challenges that intersect age, sexual orientation, and societal attitudes. Objectives This study aimed to explore the relationship between social acceptance and isolation with discrimination and the impact on the psychological well-being of older MSM. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was administered among older MSM residing in three distinct regions: the People's Republic of China (PRC), Hong Kong, and Taiwan, with a total sample size of N = 453 participants, evenly distributed with N = 151 individuals from each region. The survey included the General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12), the Discrimination and Self-Stigma Evaluation Scale (DSSES), and the Perceived Acceptance Scale (PAS) which measures the perceived social acceptance from friends, mother, father, and family. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, ANOVA, and regression analysis. RESULTS: The mean scores of the GHQ-12 indicated that the participants had a moderate level of psychological distress, with a mean score of 6.38 (SD = 2.55). The DSSES mean score was 27.78 (SD = 8.73), indicating that participants experienced discrimination in their everyday lives. The PAS mean score was 3.08 (SD = 0.48), indicating that participants had a moderate level of perceived social acceptance. These results suggest that discrimination and social acceptance differ among older MSM in different areas in PRC, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. CONCLUSIONS: The study highlights the impact of discrimination and social acceptance on the psychological well-being of older MSM. The findings suggest that interventions aimed at reducing discrimination and promoting social acceptance may improve the psychological well-being of older MSM. These results have important implications for healthcare providers and policymakers in developing strategies to promote social acceptance and reduce discrimination towards older MSM.

Does subjective social status affect pain thresholds? - an experimental examination.

Past research regarding the relationship between different constructs of social status and different aspects of pain has yielded divergent results. So far, there are few experimental studies to investigate the causal relationship between social status and pain. Therefore, the present study aimed to examine the effect of perceived social status on pain thresholds by experimentally manipulating participants' subjective social status (SSS). 51 female undergraduates were randomly assigned to a low- or high-status condition. Participants' perceived social standing was temporarily elevated (high SSS condition) or reduced (low SSS condition). Before and after experimental manipulation participants' pressure pain thresholds were assessed. The manipulation check confirmed that participants in the low-status condition reported significantly lower SSS than participants in the high-status condition. A linear mixed model revealed a significant group x time interaction for pain thresholds: Whereas participants' pain thresholds in the low SSS condition increased post manipulation, pain thresholds of participants in the high SSS condition decreased post manipulation (ß = 0.22; 95% CI, 0.002 to 0.432; p < .05). Findings suggest that SSS may have a causal effect on pain thresholds. This effect could either be due to a change in pain perception or a change in pain expression. Future research is needed to determine the mediating factors.

The importance of social rejection as reputational sanction in fostering peace.

I challenge the idea by Glowacki that "strong sanctions" such as fines, physical punishment, or execution are more effective in promoting peace than "weak punishments" like social rejection. Reviewing evidence that social rejection can have significant social and psychological costs for norm violators, I propose that social rejection can serve as a powerful reputational sanction in fostering peace in society.

Peer Influences on (Dis)Engagement in Early Adolescence: the Role of Friendship, Social Status, and Academic Status.

Academic engagement in adolescence is shaped by influences from the peer environment, yet the types of peers impacting engagement remain unclear. This study explores the roles of friends, popular students, and intelligent students in shaping peers' behavioral and emotional (dis)engagement. Data were analyzed from 3409 Flemish eighth-grade students (Mage = 13.48 years, SD = 0.46, 50.09% female), utilizing self-reports and peer nominations to measure (dis)engagement and map friendship, popularity, and intelligence networks in the fall and spring. Longitudinal network analysis revealed that, while accounting for selection and network structure, friends influenced all dimensions of engagement. Popular students influenced emotional disengagement, and intelligent students impacted emotional engagement. These findings underscore the intricate nature of peer dynamics, highlighting the need for a multidimensional approach to studying peer influences on engagement.

Allostatic-interoceptive anticipation of social rejection.

Anticipating social stress evokes strong reactions in the organism, including interoceptive modulations. However, evidence for this claim comes from behavioral studies, often with inconsistent results, and relates almost solely to the reactive and recovery phase of social stress exposure. Here, we adopted an allostatic-interoceptive predictive coding framework to study interoceptive and exteroceptive anticipatory brain responses using a social rejection task. We analyzed the heart-evoked potential (HEP) and task-related oscillatory activity of 58 adolescents via scalp EEG, and 385 human intracranial recordings of three patients with intractable epilepsy. We found that anticipatory interoceptive signals increased in the face of unexpected social outcomes, reflected in larger negative HEP modulations. Such signals emerged from key brain allostatic-interoceptive network hubs, as shown by intracranial recordings. Exteroceptive signals were characterized by early activity between 1-15 Hz across conditions, and modulated by the probabilistic anticipation of reward-related outcomes, observed over distributed brain regions. Our findings suggest that the anticipation of a social outcome is characterized by allostatic-interoceptive modulations that prepare the organism for possible rejection. These results inform our understanding of interoceptive processing and constrain neurobiological models of social stress.

Subjective social status, race, and metabolic syndrome in women with breast cancer.

PURPOSE: To evaluate the association of subjective social status (SSS) with metabolic syndrome (MetS) severity and its potential contribution to racial health disparities in women with breast cancer. METHODS: Multicenter cross-sectional study (10 US hospitals) in women (n = 1206) with primary diagnosis of invasive breast cancer received during Mar/2013-Feb/2020. Participants, self-identified as non-Hispanic White or Black, underwent physical and laboratory examinations and survey questions assessing socioeconomic parameters, medical history, and behavioral risks. SSS was measured with the 10-rung MacArthur scale. MetS severity was measured with a validated Z-Score. Generalized linear mixed modeling was used to analyze the associations. Missing data were handled using multiple imputation. RESULTS: Average age was 58 years. On average, the SSS of Black women, given equivalent level of income and education, was lower than the SSS of White women: 6.6 (6.1-7.0) vs 7.7 (7.54-7.79) among college graduates and 6.8 (6.4-7.2) vs 7.6 (7.5-7.8) among women in the high-income category (> $75,000). In multivariable analysis, after controlling for age, income, education, diet, and physical activity, increasing SSS was associated with a decrease in MetS-Z score, - 0.10 (- 0.16 to - 0.04) per every 2 rung increase in the MacArthur scale. CONCLUSION: Black women with breast cancer rank their SSS lower than White women with breast cancer do at each level of income and education. As SSS is strongly associated with MetS severity these results identify potentially modifiable factors that contribute to racial disparities.

Transmission of social status drives cooperation and offspring philopatry.

The evolution of cooperation depends on two crucial overarching factors: relatedness, which describes the extent to which the recipient shares genes in common with the actor; and quality, which describes the recipient's basic capacity to transmit genes into the future. While most research has focused on relatedness, there is a growing interest in understanding how quality modulates the evolution of cooperation. However, the impact of inheritance of quality on the evolution of cooperation remains largely unexplored, especially in spatially structured populations. Here, we develop a mathematical model to understand how inheritance of quality, in the form of social status, influences the evolution of helping and harming within social groups in a viscous-population setting. We find that: (1) status-reversal transmission, whereby parental and offspring status are negatively correlated, strongly inhibits the evolution of cooperation, with low-status individuals investing less in cooperation and high-status individuals being more prone to harm; (2) transmission of high status promotes offspring philopatry, with more cooperation being directed towards the higher-dispersal social class; and (3) fertility inequality and inter-generational status inheritance reduce within-group conflict. Overall, our study highlights the importance of considering different mechanisms of phenotypic inheritance, including social support, and their potential interactions in shaping animal societies.

Importance of caregivers' subjective social status and neighbourhood disadvantage for adolescents with type 1 diabetes.

AIMS: Adolescents with type 1 diabetes from low-income populations are more likely to have difficulty in managing their diabetes and ultimately have poorer glycaemic outcomes, but less is known about neighbourhood-level factors or subjective social status (SSS) as risk/protective factors. We examined associations between multiple indicators of socio-economic status with diabetes outcomes. METHODS: One hundred and ninety-eight adolescents ages 13-17 (58% female, 58% White, non-Hispanic) experiencing moderate diabetes distress completed measures of diabetes management and diabetes distress, and their caregivers reported on SSS. Glycaemic indicators were extracted from medical records, and participants' addresses were used to determine area deprivation index (ADI). RESULTS: Higher levels of neighbourhood disadvantage were significantly associated with higher haemoglobin A1c levels and average glucose levels, but caregivers' SSS was more strongly associated with all glycaemic indicators, diabetes management and diabetes distress. CONCLUSIONS: Given strong associations between caregivers' SSS and glycaemic control, diabetes management, and diabetes distress, screening for caregivers' SSS may identify adolescents who would benefit from additional support.

Social status influences relationships between hormones and oxidative stress in a cichlid fish.

An individual's social environment can have widespread effects on their physiology, including effects on oxidative stress and hormone levels. Many studies have suggested that variation in oxidative stress experienced by individuals of different social statuses might be due to endocrine differences, however, few studies have evaluated this hypothesis. Here, we assessed whether a suite of markers associated with oxidative stress in different tissues (blood/plasma, liver, and gonads) had social status-specific relationships with circulating testosterone or cortisol levels in males of a cichlid fish, Astatotilapia burtoni. Across all fish, blood DNA damage (a global marker of oxidative stress) and gonadal synthesis of reactive oxygen species [as indicated by NADPH-oxidase (NOX) activity] were lower when testosterone was high. However, high DNA damage in both the blood and gonads was associated with high cortisol in subordinates, but low cortisol in dominants. Additionally, high cortisol was associated with greater production of reactive oxygen species (greater NOX activity) in both the gonads (dominants only) and liver (dominants and subordinates). In general, high testosterone was associated with lower oxidative stress across both social statuses, whereas high cortisol was associated with lower oxidative stress in dominants and higher oxidative stress in subordinates. Taken together, our results show that differences in the social environment can lead to contrasting relationships between hormones and oxidative stress.

Subjective Social Status and Longitudinal Changes in Systemic Inflammation.

BACKGROUND: Subjective social status (SSS) refers to a person's perception of their social rank relative to others and is cross-sectionally linked to systemic inflammation independently of objective socioeconomic status. PURPOSE: We test the extent to which SSS relates to multiyear changes in inflammation, or if associations differ by race or sex. METHODS: Healthy adults (N = 331; 30-51 years) completed a baseline visit and 278 participants returned for a second visit 2.85 years later. At both visits, participants underwent a fasting blood draw and completed community (SSSC) and US (SSSUS) versions of the MacArthur Scale. Multiple linear regression analyses examined change in interleukin-6 (IL-6) and C-reactive protein (CRP) predicted by each type of SSS, adjusting for time between visits, sex, race, age, body mass index, smoking, baseline inflammation, and objective socioeconomic status. Additional analyses further adjusted for hopelessness and depressive symptoms. Interactions examined moderations by sex and race. RESULTS: Lower SSSC was longitudinally associated with greater IL-6 independently of all covariates, including education and income (ß = -0.06), hopelessness (ß = -0.06), and depressive symptoms (ß = -0.06). Lower SSSUS was longitudinally associated with greater IL-6 independently of demographic covariates including education and income (ß = -0.06), but was slightly attenuated after adjusting for hopelessness (ß = -0.06) and depressive symptoms (ß = -0.06). There were no associations for CRP or moderation by race or sex. CONCLUSIONS: Lower SSS may be associated with greater circulating markers of inflammation over time as suggested by increases in IL-6.

Subjective social status (SSS) refers to how people perceive their social rank compared with others and has been linked to meaningful differences in physical health. Increases in inflammation may contribute to associations between lower SSS and poorer physical health. In a sample of healthy adults, we examined whether SSS was associated with prospective, multiyear changes in markers of systemic inflammation and if this differed by sex or race. We found that adults who perceived their social status as lower than peers in their community exhibited an accelerated increase in interleukin-6, a marker of systemic inflammation, over a 3-year period. When participants were asked to compare themselves to people in the broader USA, the pattern was similar but less robust. Results were independent of individual differences in sociodemographic characteristics including family-adjusted income and education. Findings did not differ by sex or race and were not explained by differences in adiposity and symptoms of depression and hopelessness. Effects for C-reactive protein, a second marker of inflammation, were generally nonsignificant. Although preliminary, findings suggest an immune pathway by which perceived social status may relate to chronic diseases of aging.

Group size rather than social status influences personal immune efficacy in a socially polymorphic bee.

The evolution of group living is associated with increased pressure from parasites and pathogens. This can be offset by greater investment in personal immune defences and/or the development of cooperative immune defences (social immunity). An enduring question in evolutionary biology is whether social-immune benefits arose in response to an increased need in more complex societies, or arose early in group living and helped facilitate the evolution of more complex societies. In this study, we shed light on this question through investigating how immunity varies intraspecifically in a socially polymorphic bee. Using a novel immune assay, we show that personal antibacterial efficacy in individuals from social nests is higher than that of solitary individuals, but that this can be explained by higher densities in social nests. We conclude that personal immune effects are likely to play a role in the social/solitary transition in this species. These patterns are consistent with the idea that social immunity evolved secondarily, following the evolution of group living. The flexibility of the individual immune system may have favoured a reliance on its use during the facultative phase early in social evolution.

Children can represent complex social status hierarchies: Evidence from Indonesia.

Children's ethnicity-status associations are often studied in societies where one ethnic group possesses status across multiple dimensions, such as political influence and wealth. This study examined children's (6-12 years) and adults' representations of more complex hierarchies in Indonesia (N = 341; 38% Native Indonesian, 33% Chinese Indonesian, and 27% other ethnicities; 55% female, 36% male; 2021-2022), a society where ethnic groups hold distinct forms of status (on average, Native Indonesians have political influence; Chinese Indonesians have wealth). By 6.5 years, children associated Native Indonesians with political influence and Chinese Indonesians with wealth. Intersectional analyses indicated that ethnicity-status associations were stronger for male than female targets. Children of all ethnicities preferred Chinese Indonesians and preferences were predicted by wealth judgments.

The influence of social status on children's merit-based resource allocation: The potential explanation of expectation.

How 3- to 11-year-old children integrate recipients' merit and social status when allocating resources was examined in 2021 and 2022. Study 1 (Han Chinese, n = 309, 150 girls) showed that while children prioritized merit, they developed from favoring high-status recipients to favoring low-status recipients. Study 2 (n = 194, 98 girls) and Study 3 (n = 138, 68 girls) revealed that children held stereotypes about the relation between merit and social status which shifted with age from expecting high-status peers to expecting low-status peers to work harder, these expectations corresponded allocation decisions. These findings suggest children shift from perpetuating to rectifying inequity and changing stereotypes about people of different social status may serve an important function in the process.

Frontal EEG asymmetry moderates the relation between borderline personality disorder features and feelings of social rejection in adolescents.

Although associations among borderline personality disorder (BPD), social rejection, and frontal EEG alpha asymmetry scores (FAA, a neural correlate of emotion regulation and approach-withdrawal motivations) have been explored in different studies, relatively little work has examined these relations during adolescence in the same study. We examined whether FAA moderated the relation between BPD features and rejection sensitivity following a validated social exclusion paradigm, Cyberball. A mixed, clinical-community sample of 64 adolescents (females = 62.5%; Mage = 14.45 years; SD = 1.6; range = 11-17 years) completed psychodiagnostic interviews and a self-report measure of BPD (Time 1). Approximately two weeks later (Time 2), participants completed a resting EEG recording followed by Cyberball. FAA moderated the relation between BPD features and overall feelings of rejection following Cyberball: individuals with greater relative left FAA had the highest and lowest feelings of social rejection depending on whether they had high and low BPD feature scores, respectively. Results remained after controlling for age, sex, gender, depression, and BPD diagnosis. These results suggest that FAA may moderate the relation between BPD features and social rejection, and that left frontal brain activity at rest may be differentially associated with those feelings in BPD. Findings are discussed in terms of the link between left frontal brain activity in the regulation and dysregulation of social approach behaviors, characteristic of BPD.