title: Neural signatures of social conformity: A coordinate-based activation likelihood estimation meta-analysis of functional brain imaging studies.
abstract: People often align their behaviors with group opinions, known as social conformity. Many neuroscience studies have explored the neuropsychological mechanisms underlying social conformity. Here we employed a coordinate-based meta-analysis on neuroimaging studies of social conformity with the purpose to reveal the convergence of the underlying neural architecture. We identified a convergence of reported activation foci in regions associated with normative decision-making, including ventral striatum (VS), dorsal posterior medial frontal cortex (dorsal pMFC), and anterior insula (AI). Specifically, consistent deactivation of VS and activation of dorsal pMFC and AI are identified when people's responses deviate from group opinions. In addition, the deviation-related responses in dorsal pMFC predict people's conforming behavioral adjustments. These are consistent with current models that disagreement with others might evoke "error" signals, cognitive imbalance, and/or aversive feelings, which are plausibly detected in these brain regions as control signals to facilitate subsequent conforming behaviors. Finally, group opinions result in altered neural correlates of valuation, manifested as stronger responses of VS to stimuli endorsed than disliked by others.
authors: Key Laboratory of Behavioral Science, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100101, Beijing, China.
authors: Haiyan
authors: H
authors: Wu
authors: State Key Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience and Learning, Beijing Normal University, 100875, Beijing, China.
authors: Yi
authors: Y
authors: Luo
authors: State Key Laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience and Learning, Beijing Normal University, 100875, Beijing, China. Electronic address: chunliang.feng@gmail.com.
authors: Chunliang
authors: C
authors: Feng
mesh_terms: D001921:Brain; D001931:Brain Mapping; D059907:Functional Neuroimaging; D006801:Humans; D016013:Likelihood Functions; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D012925:Social Conformity
keywords: AI (Anterior insula); Activation likelihood estimation; Dorsal pMFC (dorsal posterior medial frontal cortex); Meta-analysis; Norm violations; Social conformity; Ultimatum game; VS (Ventral striatum)