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social learning

·May 27, 2025·3 min read

Amygdala Shapes Social Choices in Song-Learning Young Birds

Young zebra finches learn their birdsong by observing and imitating adult "tutor" birds, but they don’t follow just anyone. A new study shows that juvenile finches prefer tutors who sing longer but less often, suggesting social cues guide their choices.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·October 23, 2024·5 min read

How Social Learning Guides Decisions When Preferences Differ

A new study shows that humans use social information to guide their decisions, even when others’ preferences differ from their own. Researchers found that people treat social cues as helpful but less reliable than their personal experiences, using them as a tool to explore decision options.

This shows a woman's face and psychedelic swirls.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·June 14, 2023·6 min read

Psychedelics Unlock Learning Windows in the Brain

Researchers discovered a unique property of psychedelic drugs: their ability to reopen "critical periods" in the brain, times when the brain is highly susceptible to environmental learning signals. These periods, usually associated with skills development like language learning, are reopened by psychedelics for different lengths of time.

Featured Neuroscience

·March 9, 2023·4 min read

Complex Learned Social Behavior Discovered in Bee’s Waggle Dance

A bee's "waggle dance", an intricate series of motions that signals the location of critical resources to other bees, is improved by social learning and can be culturally transmitted.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·August 27, 2021·2 min read

A New Model for Group Decision-Making Shows How ‘Followers’ Can Influence the Outcome

A new mathematical model evaluates the influence of social learners in group decision-making and how a critical threshold is key to informed choices.

This shows a loop diagram of the learning types in the brain

Featured Neuroscience Open Neuroscience Articles

·August 20, 2020·5 min read

When Learning on Your Own Is Not Enough

Neuroimaging study reveals social learning is represented in the anterior cingulate cortex, while direct learning is represented in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex. The two areas both interact with the striatum, which helps compute both reward prediction error and social prediction error.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·November 5, 2018·2 min read

Glimpses Into Brain Uncover Neurological Basis for Processing Social Information

Researchers shed light on how the mammalian brain processes critical social information.

Featured Psychology

·June 27, 2018·6 min read

Extreme Childhood Stress Can Harm Social Learning for Years to Come

Researchers explore how early extreme childhood stress can have a negative impact on social learning and mental health later in life.

Featured Neuroscience Psychology

·May 16, 2018·4 min read

Our Brains Are Obsessed with Being Social

Researchers report the temporoparietal junction and medial prefrontal cortex experience increased connectivity during rest following encoding new social information.