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Prosocial behaviors are actions intended to benefit others, such as helping, sharing, and cooperating with others. As a fundamental aspect of social interaction, prosocial actions help us to engage and connect with others, build and maintain friendships, navigate social con-texts successfully, and thus contribute indispensably to our health and well-being. Prosocial behavior may also play an important role in student’s learning and in educational settings more broadly. That is, prosocial behavior may not only relate positively to well-being and social outcomes, such as acceptance and connections among students, but also to their academic outcomes. Despite the potential link of prosocial behavior with student’s wellbeing and educational achievement, this relation remains poorly understood, and under-addressed in students. Furthermore, students face significant pressure to perform academically and often encounter a common stressor in college: exams. This stressful environment can impact students' prosocial behavior and educational achievements. Acute stress may affect our cognition and potentially influencing our behavior towards others (Forbes et al., preprint). However, studies on prosocial decision making under acute stress have produced inconsistent results. Some studies suggest that acute stress increases prosocial tendencies, while other studies show decreases, or no effects. For the first, it may be that stressors trigger affiliative needs (tend and befriend). For the latter, increased self-focus, or changes in reward sensitivity have been proposed to explain how acute stress influences prosocial behavior. Everyday prosocial behavior, such as donating to charity or helping colleagues, requires varying levels of effort (Lockwood et al., 2017), and it is unclear how stress affects this type of behavior. Finally, previous work has often not separated the influence of self and other motivation. It could be that those who are more prosocially motivated are more academically successful, or that being more motivated in general impacts on academic achievement. Therefore, experimental paradigms are needed that can measure both self-benefitting motivation and prosocial motivation within the same individual to dissociate these processes. Here we examine the link between prosocial behavior, stressful experiences, and educational achievement in students. Therefore, we will include two groups of participants. The first group will participate in two sessions: one session during and another after their exams (experimental group). The second group, serving as the control group, will also participate in two sessions during the school year, but without experiencing exams. In both sessions, participants will engage in an adapted Prosocial Effort Task (Lockwood et al., 2017; Contreras-Huerta et al., 2022) and complete various questionnaires.

Changing collective behaviour and supporting non-pharmaceutical interventions is an important component in mitigating virus transmission during a pandemic. In a large international collaboration (Study 1, N = 49,968 across 67 countries), we investigated self-reported factors associated with public health behaviours (e.g., spatial distancing and stricter hygiene) and endorsed public policy interventions (e.g., closing bars and restaurants) during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic (April-May 2020). Respondents who reported identifying more strongly with their nation consistently reported greater engagement in public health behaviours and support for public health policies. Results were similar for representative and non-representative national samples. Study 2 (N = 42 countries) conceptually replicated the central finding using aggregate indices of national identity (obtained using the World Values Survey) and a measure of actual behaviour change during the pandemic (obtained from Google mobility reports). Higher levels of national identification prior to the pandemic predicted lower mobility during the early stage of the pandemic (r = −0.40). We discuss the potential implications of links between national identity, leadership, and public health for managing COVID-19 and future pandemics.

Neural mechanisms of learning for self and other

Data and code for the article: Cutler, J., Wittmann, M.K., Abdurahman, A., Hargitai, L.D, Drew, D., Husain, M. & Lockwood, P.L. Ageing is associated with disrupted reinforcement learning whilst learning to help others is preserved. Nat Commun 12, 4440 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-24576-w

All data and analysis materials to reproduce results from "Ageing increases prosocial motivation for effort" (accepted in Psychological Science). Files 'K_values_2k1b', 'lme_data_PM_young_old_final' and 'PM_debrief_final' contain all the raw data. File 'analysis_code_PM_ageing_OSF' contains R code with comments for running statistical tests reported in the manuscript and 'Reproduce_figures_prosocial_ageing' contains R code for plotting the figures in the manuscript. Please contact Patricia Lockwood (patricia.l.lockwood@gmail.com) and Anthony Gabay (GabayAS@adf.bham.ac.uk) for any questions.

Social cohesion relies on prosociality in increasingly aging populations. Helping other people requires effort, yet how willing people are to exert effort to benefit themselves and others, and whether such behaviors shift across the life span, is poorly understood. Using computational modeling, we tested the willingness of 95 younger adults (18-36 years old) and 92 older adults (55-84 years old) to put physical effort into self- and other-benefiting acts. Participants chose whether to work and exert force (30%-70% of maximum grip strength) for rewards (2-10 credits) accrued for themselves or, prosocially, for another. Younger adults were somewhat selfish, choosing to work more at higher effort levels for themselves, and exerted less force in prosocial work. Strikingly, compared with younger adults, older people were more willing to put in effort for others and exerted equal force for themselves and others. Increased prosociality in older people has important implications for human behavior and societal structure.

AMI-CV paper versions in English available under materials. German and Russian languages are available in materials/AMI_CV_Supplement_v2 Lab group Github link for this project: https://github.com/DevComPsy/AMI_child contact S Hewitt if you have questions or issues (s.hewitt.17@ucl.ac.uk) change log: May 2023: updated supplementary material and analysis code 12 May 2023 for revised manuscript July 2023 updated supplementary material to include manuscript DOI, added separate AMI-CV paper version

International audience; Background: Apathy is present in several psychiatric and neurological conditions and has been found to have a severe negative effect on disease progression. In older people, it can be a predictor of increased dementia risk. Current assessment methods lack objectivity and sensitivity, thus new diagnostic tools and broad-scale screening technologies are needed. Objective: This study is the first of its kind aiming to investigate whether automatic speech analysis could be used for characterization and detection of apathy. Methods: A group of apathetic and non-apathetic patients (n = 60) with mild to moderate neurocognitive disorder were recorded while performing two short narrative speech tasks. Paralinguistic markers relating to prosodic, formant, source, and temporal qualities of speech were automatically extracted, examined between the groups and compared to baseline assessments. Machine learning experiments were carried out to validate the diagnostic power of extracted markers.Results: Correlations between apathy sub-scales and features revealed a relation between temporal aspects of speech and the subdomains of reduction in interest and initiative, as well as between prosody features and the affective domain. Group differences were found to vary for males and females, depending on the task. Differences in temporal aspects of speech were found to be the most consistent difference between apathetic and non-apathetic patients. Machine learning models trained on speech features achieved top performances of AUC = 0.88 for males and AUC = 0.77 for females. Conclusions: These findings reinforce the usability of speech as a reliable biomarker in the detection and assessment of apathy.

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-pss-10.1177_0956797620975781 for Aging Increases Prosocial Motivation for Effort by Patricia L. Lockwood, Ayat Abdurahman, Anthony S. Gabay, Daniel Drew, Marin Tamm, Masud Husain and Matthew A. J. Apps in Psychological Science

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-pss-10.1177_0956797620975781 for Aging Increases Prosocial Motivation for Effort by Patricia L. Lockwood, Ayat Abdurahman, Anthony S. Gabay, Daniel Drew, Marin Tamm, Masud Husain and Matthew A. J. Apps in Psychological Science

Social neuroscience aims to describe the neural systems that underpin social cognition and behaviour. Over the past decade, researchers have begun to combine computational models with neuroimaging to link social computations to the brain. Inspired by approaches from reinforcement learning theory, which describes how decisions are driven by the unexpectedness of outcomes, accounts of the neural basis of prosocial learning, observational learning, mentalizing and impression formation have been developed. Here we provide an introduction for researchers who wish to use these models in their studies. We consider both theoretical and practical issues related to their implementation, with a focus on specific examples from the field.

Apathy is a debilitating but poorly understood disorder characterized by a reduction in motivation. As well as being associated with several brain disorders, apathy is also prevalent in varying degrees in healthy people. Whilst many tools have been developed to assess levels of apathy in clinical disorders, surprisingly there are no measures of apathy suitable for healthy people. Moreover, although apathy is commonly comorbid with symptoms of depression, anhedonia and fatigue, how and why these symptoms are associated is unclear. Here we developed the Apathy-Motivation Index (AMI), a brief self-report index of apathy and motivation. Using exploratory factor analysis (in a sample of 505 people), and then confirmatory analysis (in a different set of 479 individuals), we identified subtypes of apathy in behavioural, social and emotional domains. Latent profile analyses showed four different profiles of apathy that were associated with varying levels of depression, anhedonia and fatigue. The AMI is a novel and reliable measure of individual differences in apathy and might provide a useful means of probing different mechanisms underlying sub-clinical lack of motivation in otherwise healthy individuals. Moreover, associations between apathy and comorbid states may be reflective of problems in different emotional, social and behavioural domains.

Empathy, the ability to vicariously experience and to understand the affect of other people, is fundamental for successful social-cognitive ability and behaviour. Empathy is thought to be a critical facilitator of prosocial behaviour and is disrupted in a number of psychiatric and neurological disorders. Research has begun to uncover the neural basis of such 'vicarious experience', which has been studied as a proxy measure of empathy. Together, these studies have identified portions of the insula and anterior cingulate cortex as critically involved. A key debate is whether overlapping or non-overlapping brain areas respond to personal and vicarious experience. This review will highlight emerging evidence for both types of brain response. Importantly, animal models have suggested that there are central divisions between the anterior cingulate gyrus and anterior cingulate sulcus that may be crucial for understanding social behaviour. Attention to this specific anatomy of vicarious processing could therefore help shed light on the functional profile of empathy. Studies in individuals with psychopathy and autism spectrum disorders have found that vicarious experience is atypical. However, the precise nature of these atypicalities is mixed. Understanding the mechanisms of vicarious experience can enhance our knowledge of the neural basis of empathy and, ultimately, help those with disorders of social cognition and behaviour.

Funder: Research Council of Norway through its Centres of Excellence Scheme, FAIR project No 262675, Funder: J. William Fulbright Program, Funder: Institute for Lifecourse Development, University of Greenwich, Funder: Economic Social Research Council Impact Acceleration Award, University of Oxford, Funder: Institute of Social Sciences Ivo Pilar, Funder: Academy of Finland (Suomen Akatemia); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100002341, Funder: Universit��t Wien (University of Vienna); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100003065, Funder: Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan (Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100004663, Funder: NOMIS Stiftung (NOMIS Foundation); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100008483, Funder: Princeton Graduate Student Research Funding (Program in Cognitive Science), Funder: Corruption Laboratory on Ethics, Accountability, and the Rule of Law (CLEAR), University of Virginia, Funder: Project Pro.Co.P.E., IMT School (PAI2019), Funder: Italian Ministry of University and Research - PRIN 2017 (20178293XT), Funder: Gouvernement du Canada | Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (Conseil de Recherches en Sciences Naturelles et en G��nie du Canada); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100000038, Funder: Australian Research Council (DP180102384), Funder: Ernst and Young (EY); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100003064, Changing collective behaviour and supporting non-pharmaceutical interventions is an important component in mitigating virus transmission during a pandemic. In a large international collaboration (Study 1, N = 49,968 across 67 countries), we investigated self-reported factors associated with public health behaviours (e.g., spatial distancing and stricter hygiene) and endorsed public policy interventions (e.g., closing bars and restaurants) during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic (April-May 2020). Respondents who reported identifying more strongly with their nation consistently reported greater engagement in public health behaviours and support for public health policies. Results were similar for representative and non-representative national samples. Study 2 (N = 42 countries) conceptually replicated the central finding using aggregate indices of national identity (obtained using the World Values Survey) and a measure of actual behaviour change during the pandemic (obtained from Google mobility reports). Higher levels of national identification prior to the pandemic predicted lower mobility during the early stage of the pandemic (r = -0.40). We discuss the potential implications of links between national identity, leadership, and public health for managing COVID-19 and future pandemics.

Funder: Wellcome Trust (Wellcome); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/100004440, Funder: DH | National Institute for Health Research (NIHR); doi: https://doi.org/10.13039/501100000272, Funder: Christ Church Junior Research Fellowship Christ Church Research Centre Grant, Reinforcement learning is a fundamental mechanism displayed by many species. However, adaptive behaviour depends not only on learning about actions and outcomes that affect ourselves, but also those that affect others. Using computational reinforcement learning models, we tested whether young (age 18–36) and older (age 60–80, total n = 152) adults learn to gain rewards for themselves, another person (prosocial), or neither individual (control). Detailed model comparison showed that a model with separate learning rates for each recipient best explained behaviour. Young adults learned faster when their actions benefitted themselves, compared to others. Compared to young adults, older adults showed reduced self-relevant learning rates but preserved prosocial learning. Moreover, levels of subclinical self-reported psychopathic traits (including lack of concern for others) were lower in older adults and the core affective-interpersonal component of this measure negatively correlated with prosocial learning. These findings suggest learning to benefit others is preserved across the lifespan with implications for reinforcement learning and theories of healthy ageing.

Secondary liver lesions are frequently encountered in neuroendocrine tumours (NET) of the gastro-entero-pancreatic tract. Although conventional morphologic imaging modalities and somatostatin receptor scintigraphy (SRS) have been extensively used in past decades, with the advent of PET/CT, new diagnostic procedures are currently available with the employment of different beta emitting tracers. In fact NET can be easily visualised on PET scans using an array of both metabolic and receptor-based tracers. 3,4-dihydroxy-6-[18F]fluoro-L-phenylalanine (18F-DOPA) and 68Ga-DOTApeptides (DOTA-TOC, DOTA-NOC, DOTA-TATE) are very promising to image well-differentiated NET and were reported to be superior to other imaging modalities (CT, SRS). On the contrary, the role of 18F-FDG is limited in well-differentiated NET, due to their low glucose metabolism and growth rate, while it can still provide valuable information in less differentiated NET or in forms with lower expression of somatostatin receptors.