The independent Max Planck research group for Social Neuroscience is hosted by the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich. The aim of this research group is to contribute to the development of innovative and truly interactive experimental paradigms within social neuroscience, which allow for the investigation of the neural mechanisms of real-time social interaction. As psychiatric disorders
are characterized by impairments of social interaction, providing such insights can help to study commonalities and differences of disorder-associated neurofunctional alterations and contribute to the assessment and prediction of treatment effects. To this end, we combine functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) with real-time analyses of eye-tracking data to generate interactive paradigms, which allow us to study the neural mechanisms of participation in (gaze-based) social interaction and to compare them to the neural correlates of social observation. Here, we use univariate, model-based as well as multivariate analysis approaches. These studies are complemented by pharmacogenetic and other interventions. Furthermore, we conduct behavioral, psychophysiological and resting state fMRI studies to investigate the impact of social interaction on prosocial behavior, capacities for self-regulation and decision-making and on intrinsic network connectivity. Also, we are using information from diffusion-based MRI measurements to investigate structure-function relationships of the human brain and their impact on social interaction capacities. Based on the assumption that psychiatric disorders are characterized by impairments of social interaction as much as, or even more extensively than, social observation, we also investigate these difficulties across different patient groups in line with a transdiagnostic approach in collaboration with the Clinic for Disorders of Social Interaction (https://www.facebook.com/Interaktionsambulanz). Here, our aim is to investigate commonalities and differences of disorders-associated changes in the neurofunctional systems that are relevant for successful participation in social interaction. This translation of insights obtained from investigations of the neural mechanisms of social interaction in healthy individuals to individuals with psychiatric disorders may open up new perspectives for functional neuroimaging in psychiatry and psychotherapy and could promote further development of diagnostic procedures and treatment options.
