title: Neural correlates of personal space intrusion.
abstract: A parietal-frontal network in primates is thought to support many behaviors occurring in the space around the body, including interpersonal interactions and maintenance of a particular "comfort zone" or distance from other people ("personal space"). To better understand this network in humans, we used functional MRI to measure the responses to moving objects (faces, cars, simple spheres) and the functional connectivity of two regions in this network, the dorsal intraparietal sulcus (DIPS) and the ventral premotor cortex (PMv). We found that both areas responded more strongly to faces that were moving toward (vs away from) subjects, but did not show this bias in response to comparable motion in control stimuli (cars or spheres). Moreover, these two regions were functionally interconnected. Tests of activity-behavior associations revealed that the strength of DIPS-PMv connectivity was correlated with the preferred distance that subjects chose to stand from an unfamiliar person (personal space size). In addition, the magnitude of DIPS and PMv responses was correlated with the preferred level of social activity. Together, these findings suggest that this parietal-frontal network plays a role in everyday interactions with others.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts 02114, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Charlestown, Massachusetts 02129, Department of Psychology, Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts 02453, National Institute of Mental Health, Bethesda, Maryland 20892, McLean Hospital, Belmont, Massachusetts 02478, and Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts 02114.
authors.forename: Daphne J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Holt
authors.forename: Brittany S
authors.initials: BS
authors.lastname: Cassidy
authors.forename: Xiaomin
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Yue
authors.forename: Scott L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Rauch
authors.forename: Emily A
authors.initials: EA
authors.lastname: Boeke
authors.forename: Shahin
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Nasr
authors.forename: Roger B H
authors.initials: RB
authors.lastname: Tootell
authors.forename: Garth
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Coombs
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009039:Motion Perception / Q000502:physiology; D009415:Nerve Net / Q000502:physiology*; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000502:physiology; D010550:Personal Space; D012919:Social Behavior
keywords: connectivity; fMRI; intraparietal sulcus; personal space; premotor cortex; social behavior