Overview of Social Neuroscience

Complex social environments are the primary selective pressure for the human brain. Mankind must evolve specialized brain networks to rapidly process social information(e.g., identification of social signals). However, the exact cognition mechanisms remain unclear. Social neuroscience is the burgeoning field that studies social behavior and underlying neural structures by applying an interdisciplinary, multilevel analysis. It has been fruitful and contributed to fields ranging from psychiatry to economics since its first appearance as a term in 1992. In this article, we systematically review four major aspects of social neuroscience: social perception, cognition, regulation and interaction. Based on that empirical evidence, we try to answer each core question of sub-domains: Is there any specialization for social perception? Is social cognition unique to humans? Is social regulation ability universal or sensitive to individual difference? We conclude that social perception is at least functionally specialized; the mentalizing system is unique to humans and social regulation ability is sensitive to individual difference. Besides, the brain-to-brain coupling may be the core mechanism of social interaction. Finally, based on the present studies and emerging techniques, we point out two broad directions for future research.