title: Social status modulates the neural response to unfairness.
abstract: In human society, which is organized by social hierarchies, resources are usually allocated unequally and based on social status. In this study, we analyze how being endowed with different social statuses in a math competition affects the perception of fairness during asset allocation in a subsequent Ultimatum Game (UG). Behavioral data showed that when participants were in high status, they were more likely to reject unfair UG offers than in low status. This effect of social status correlated with activity in the right anterior insula (rAI) and with the functional connectivity between the rAI and a region in the anterior middle cingulate cortex, indicating that these two brain regions are crucial for integrating contextual factors and social norms during fairness perception. Additionally, there was an interaction between social status and UG offer fairness in the amygdala and thalamus, implicating the role of these regions in the modulation of social status on fairness perception. These results demonstrate the effect of social status on fairness perception and the potential neural underpinnings for this effect.
authors.affiliation: Center for Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Department of Psychology, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China.
authors.forename: Jie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.affiliation: Center for Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Department of Psychology, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China.
authors.forename: Philip R
authors.initials: PR
authors.lastname: Blue
authors.affiliation: Center for Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Department of Psychology, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China.
authors.forename: Hongbo
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Embedded System and Service Computing (Ministry of Education), Tongji University, Shanghai 201804, China.
authors.forename: Xiaoliang
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Gong
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Embedded System and Service Computing (Ministry of Education), Tongji University, Shanghai 201804, China.
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Xiang
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Embedded System and Service Computing (Ministry of Education), Tongji University, Shanghai 201804, China.
authors.forename: Changjun
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Jiang
authors.affiliation: Center for Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Department of Psychology, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China, Key Laboratory of Machine Perception (Ministry of Education), Beijing Key Laboratory of Behavioral and Mental Health, Beijing 100871, China, and PKU-IDG/McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China xz104@pku.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Xiaolin
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zhou
mesh_terms: D000679:Amygdala / Q000502:physiology; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000502:physiology*; D003163:Competitive Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology*; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006179:Gyrus Cinguli / Q000502:physiology*; D006608:Hierarchy, Social; D006624:Hippocampus / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008433:Mathematics; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000502:physiology*; D012935:Social Justice; D012938:Social Perception; D012945:Social Values; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: aMCC; amygdala; fMRI; fairness perception; insula; social status