Amplitude of Low-Frequency Fluctuations During Resting State Differentially Predicts Authentic and Hubristic Pride.

Abstract

Pride is an important, self-conscious emotion composed of two distinct conceptual facets: arrogant, egotistic "hubristic pride," and pro-social, achievement-oriented "authentic pride." However, little is known about the neural basis of the two facets of pride. Here, we investigated the association between spontaneous brain activity and these two facets of pride in resting state. We measured 276 participants on authentic and hubristic pride. The fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (fALFF) was used to identify pride-related regions. The results revealed individual differences in authentic pride were associated with the fALFF in the bilateral superior temporal gyrus (STG), which has been implicated in social processing. In contrast, individual differences in hubristic pride were associated with the fALFF in the left orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) and posterior cingulate cortex (PCC), which have been implicated in self-referential and reward processing. Together, our results provide initial evidence for the distinct neural substrates for authentic and hubristic pride.