Social Reward Research Articles

Do new quality measures for social risk screening 'measure up'?

New social risk screening standards and quality metrics reward or penalize healthcare delivery organizations for social risk screening. After summarizing the recent literature on social risk screening in pediatric healthcare settings we consider how this evidence - and persistent evidence gaps - might inform future standards development. Reported social risk screening rates, measures, and modality differ greatly across recent work. Although many caregivers report acceptability of screening, experiences and expectations around effective follow-up vary. Likewise, although most frontline clinical providers find screening acceptable, they report significant implementation challenges related to time constraints, insufficient workforce, and availability of social services. Qualitative findings suggest opportunities to improve screening implementation. Literature examining the impacts of screening continues to focus on immediate posited impacts of assistance programs; few studies assess health outcomes. The existing literature does not clearly indicate whether, when, how, or for whom social risk screening standards focused on screening quantity will contribute to child health or health equity. Informed by studies on patient experience, quality measures focused on screening quantity (e.g. how many individuals are screened) should be paired with efforts to improve screening quality (i.e. patient/caregiver screening experience) as well as social and health outcomes.

Hippocampal contextualization of social rewards in mice

Acquiring and exploiting memories of rewarding experiences is critical for survival. The spatial environment in which a rewarding stimulus is encountered regulates memory retrieval. The ventral hippocampus (vH) has been implicated in contextual memories involving rewarding stimuli such as food, social cues or drugs. Yet, the neuronal representations and circuits underlying contextual memories of socially rewarding stimuli are poorly understood. Here, using in vivo electrophysiological recordings, in vivo one-photon calcium imaging, and optogenetics during a social reward contextual conditioning paradigm in male mice, we show that vH neurons discriminate between contexts with neutral or acquired social reward value. The formation of context-discriminating vH neurons following learning was contingent upon the presence of unconditioned stimuli. Moreover, vH neurons showed distinct contextual representations during the retrieval of social reward compared to fear contextual memories. Finally, optogenetic inhibition of locus coeruleus (LC) projections in the vH selectively disrupted social reward contextual memory by impairing vH contextual representations. Collectively, our findings reveal that the vH integrates contextual and social reward information, with memory encoding of these representations supported by input from the LC.

Opioid receptor and dopaminergic gene expression increase in the brains of dominant medaka Oryzias latipes males after repeated fights.

The central opioid system and dopaminergic activity in mammals play key roles in mediating social reward, impulsivity, cognition, decision making, and motivation for learning and social interactions. Repeated positive fighting experiences enhance the gene expression levels of μ-type opioid receptor (Mor), tyrosine hydroxylase (Th), an enzyme involved in dopamine synthesis, and dopamine receptor type 2 (D2r) in the reward-related brain regions of aggressive mice. However, it remains unclear whether the opioid system and dopaminergic activity are associated with repeated winning in fish. In this study, we investigated changes in the expression levels of Mor, Th1, and D2r in different regions of the brain of adult medaka Oryzias latipes males after intermittent and continuous fight for 3 days. When a pair of males was provided a fighting opportunity for 20 min per day, we noted that within the 3-day observation period, aggressive winning males showed significantly higher expression levels of Mor in telencephalon and diencephalon, Th1 in diencephalon, and D2r in telencephalon than subordinate losing males. However, no such differences in gene expression level were observed between winning and losing males in the 3-day continuous fight. Further, no differences were detected in the total number of aggressive actions among the winners from each fighting test. However, the total number of "chase" actions, with a stronger aggressiveness index, was higher for the repeated winning male in the three-time intermittent fight than for the winner in the 3-day continuous fight. These findings suggest that repeated intermittent winning experiences with strong aggressiveness could be perceived as a reward by O. latipes males.

Defining social reward: A systematic review of human and animal studies.

Social rewards are strong drivers of behavior and fundamental to well-being, yet there is a lack of consensus regarding what actually defines a reward as "social." Because a systematic overview of existing social reward operationalizations is currently absent, a review of the literature seems necessary to advance toward a unified framework and to better guide research and theory. To bridge this gap, we preregistered and conducted the first comprehensive systematic review of human and animal experimental studies that used the term "social reward" and charted existing operationalizations, revealing the implicit and explicit definitions used in the field. Stimulus characteristics and measures of social reward were extracted from a total of 384 studies encompassing 42,118 participants and subjects. We provide detailed summaries of these elements, stratified by species (human/animal) and study type (behavioral, brain imaging, pharmacological, and physiological). Two main aspects were found to account for most of the difference in operationalizations: the sensory richness of a stimulus (intimacy) and engagement in social interaction (i.e., the synchronous observation and action between at least two individuals, viz., immediacy). Drawing insights from second-person neuroscience approaches and theoretical models in the field of human-computer interaction, we propose that human and animal research can greatly benefit from considering these properties, as they have important theoretical and practical consequences for human and translational research, with far-reaching implications for neighboring research fields such as those pertaining to social media and the development of artificial intelligence. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Contested role boundaries and professional title: Implications of the independent review of podiatric surgery in Australia.

In October 2023, the Podiatry Board of Australia commissioned an independent review of the regulation of podiatric surgery in Australia, with a remit to re-evaluate the regulatory framework, identify any risks to patient safety and recommend improvements to public protection. It reported in March 2024 and set out 14 key recommendations. The review was prompted by a number of complaints about podiatric surgeons but also reflected calls for reform by the medical profession and several critical media reports. This paper sets out to examine the review report, alongside the concerns of the medical profession and the media articles expressed within it, through the lens of an established sociological framework focused on interprofessional conflict and the contested use of professional titles. As a review rather than the research paper, the Independent Review of Podiatric Surgery (the 'Paterson Report') served as data for the sociological analysis, adopting a Neo-Weberian and Bordieuan framework to examine the strategies adopted by the medical profession and media reports cited in the report, consistent with the exercise of professional power. The sociological analysis provides insights into the ways in which professions seek to maintain symbolic, social, cultural and economic privileges and rewards through the exclusion of competitors, using strategies such as social closure, symbolic violence, symbolic devaluation, gatekeeper roles, and jurisdictional disputes. The review report acknowledges the influence of the medical profession and its opposition to the practice of podiatric surgery and use of the title 'podiatric surgeon'. The arguments made and strategies deployed are consistent with those found in the wider literature. In light of these findings, the implications for the future of podiatric surgery are considered in terms of professional practice, use of professional title, and access to public funding.

How Culture and Musical Engagement Shape Musical Reward Sensitivity in Danish Teens: A Validation Study of the Danish Barcelona Musical Reward Questionnaire With 4641 Adolescents.

The ability to convey emotions and induce pleasure is one of the most important aspects of the way that music becomes meaningful to humans. Affective responses to music are specific to both cultural and personal preferences, but little is known about the individual variability in adolescence. The Barcelona Music Reward Questionnaire (BMRQ) is a psychometric measure that identifies five factors associated with musical pleasure: Musical Seeking, Emotional Evocation, Mood Regulation, Social Reward, and Sensory-Motor. With this study, we aimed to validate the BMRQ in Danish teens and to explore the differences in music reward experiences in relation to the amount of musical activity, between genders and over ages. Approximately 30,000 Danish adolescents participated in a mass experiment with a subset (N = 4641, 51.2% girls, age range = 13-19 years old) responding to (1) a Danish adaptation of the BMRQ and (2) the Concurrent Musical Activities (CCM) Questionnaire. Both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were applied, and a seven-factor model of the BMRQ was found to fit the Danish adolescent population. The seven-factor version of the Danish BMRQ was due to the split of the dimensions "Sensory-Motor" and "Social Reward" into two further subfactors. The students with a higher amount of musical engagement scored higher across all dimensions. In particular, the higher the musical engagement, the higher scores were found for the facet of musical pleasure related to the sharing of musical activities, especially in the earliest stages of adolescence. Furthermore, we found that sensitivity to music generally tends to increase with age, and that girls reported overall to be more sensitive to music than boys in the dimension related to evocation of emotions. A slightly different model of the BMRQ has to be taken into account when testing the Danish adolescent population. In addition to utilizing the Danish version of the BMRQ on a large sample of adolescents, this study may provide insight into the relationship between changes in the level of musical reward depending on amount of musical engagement and how musical reward unfolds within and between genders and across age groups during this developmental stage.

Supplemental Material for Defining Social Reward: A Systematic Review of Human and Animal Studies

Supplemental Material for Defining Social Reward: A Systematic Review of Human and Animal Studies

Autism: A review

Reduced eye contact, facial expressions, and body movements during the first three years of life are among the social behaviors and nonverbal interactions that define autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a collection of neurodevelopmental diseases. It is generally accepted that this condition is a multifactorial disorder resulting from the combination of both hereditary and non-genetic risk factors. It is not a single disorder. Studies on the genetics of ASD have found mutations that disrupt normal neurodevelopment from infancy through childhood. Axon mobility and synaptogenesis have been linked to these gene complexes. Advances in neuroimaging research have yielded numerous significant insights into the pathological alterations that take place in the brains of individuals with ASD while they are living their lives. Numerous neuropathological and neuroimaging studies have demonstrated the significance of the amygdala, a key component of the limbic system and the affective loop of the cortico-striatothalamo-cortical circuit, in cognition and ASD. The nucleus accumbens is seen as another important structure associated with the social reward response in ASD, in addition to the amygdala. While behavioral and educational interventions have traditionally been the cornerstones of ASD care, pharmaceutical and interventional therapies have also demonstrated some promise in ASD patients. Additionally, a small number of individuals have reportedly improved following deep brain stimulation, one of the interventional treatments.

Toward Context-Aware Privacy Enhancing Technologies for Online Self-Disclosure

Voluntary sharing of personal information is at the heart of user engagement on social media and central to platforms' business models. From the users' perspective, so-called self-disclosure is closely connected with both privacy risks and social rewards. Prior work has studied contextual influences on self-disclosure, from platform affordances and interface design to user demographics and perceived social capital. Our work takes a mixed-methods approach to understand the contextual information which might be integrated in the development of privacy-enhancing technologies. Through observational study of several Reddit communities, we explore the ways in which topic of discussion, group norms, peer effects, and audience size are correlated with personal information sharing. We then build and test a prototype privacy-enhancing tool that exposes these contextual factors. Our work culminates in a browser extension that automatically detects instances of self-disclosure in Reddit posts at the time of posting and provides additional context to users before they post to support enhanced privacy decision-making. We share this prototype with social media users, solicit their feedback, and outline a path forward for privacy-enhancing technologies in this space.

Depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation in sexual minority adolescents: An examination of social reward responsiveness and support as moderators

Sexual minority (SM) youth are at increased risk of depression and suicidal ideation (SI), due in part to discrimination and other stressors. This raises questions about social factors that may increase risk or resilience to stressors commonly faced by SM youth. The goal of this multimethod study was to examine both neural processing of social feedback and perceived social support as potential moderators of the association between SM identity, depressive symptoms, and endorsement of SI in adolescents. For this study, 165 adolescents aged 14–17 (22.42 % identifying as SM) were oversampled for current depression. Participants self-reported social support, depressive symptoms, and SI. Electroencephalogram (EEG) was recorded while participants completed a computerized peer interaction task in which the reward positivity (RewP) component was measured in response to social acceptance vs. rejection feedback. We tested social RewP and social support as moderators of associations between SM identity, depressive symptoms, and whether SI was reported. SM youth reported lower social support and elevated depressive symptoms and were more likely to endorse SI compared to non-SM youth. Social RewP moderated the associations between SM identity, depressive symptoms, and SI such that SM youth with blunted neural responses to social acceptance had higher depression and were more likely to endorse SI. Lower social support was associated with greater depressive symptoms and SI, but social support was not a significant moderator of the association between SM identity and symptoms. This is among the first studies to use affective neuroscience methods to examine social processes in SGM youth and our findings underscore the role of social factors in SGM youth mental health.

Selective vulnerability of parvocellular oxytocin neurons in social dysfunction

Selective vulnerability offers a conceptual framework for understanding neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, where specific neuronal types are selectively affected and adjacent ones are spared. However, the applicability of this framework to neurodevelopmental disorders, particularly those characterized by atypical social behaviors, such as autism spectrum disorder, remains uncertain. Here we show that an embryonic disturbance, known to induce social dysfunction in male mice, preferentially impaired the gene expression crucial for neural functions in parvocellular oxytocin (OT) neurons—a subtype linked to social rewards—while neighboring cell types experienced a lesser impact. Chemogenetic stimulation of OT neurons at the neonatal stage ameliorated social deficits in early adulthood, concurrent with cell-type-specific sustained recovery of pivotal gene expression within parvocellular OT neurons. Collectively, our data shed light on the transcriptomic selective vulnerability within the hypothalamic social behavioral center and provide a potential therapeutic target through specific neonatal neurostimulation.

Validation of drug-nondrug choice procedure to model maladaptive behavioural allocation to opioid use in rats.

Increased allocation of behaviour to substance abuse at the expense of personal and social rewards is a hallmark of addiction that is reflected in several of DSM-5 criteria for diagnosis of substance use disorder. Previous studies focused on refining the self-administration (SA) model to better emulate an addictive state in laboratory animals. Here, we employed concurrent SA of sucrose pellets and morphine as two competing natural and drug rewards, respectively, to validate the feasibility of capturing pathological behavioural allocation in rats. A custom-made three-lever operant chamber was used. With one active and one inactive lever presented, rats were trained to self-administer morphine (0.5mg/kg/infusion; 2h/day) under a fixed-ratio 1 (FR-1) schedule until a stable response was achieved. Next, they were trained to self-administer morphine in the presence of a third lever dispensing sucrose pellets (20 mg) under FR-1. Concurrent morphine-sucrose SA sessions (2h/day) were continued until stable morphine taking behaviour was re-established. In another experiment, rats first established stable sucrose pellet SA (2h/day, FR-1) and then were trained to take morphine (0.5mg/kg/infusion; 2h/day). Subsequently, all rats underwent extinction training, in which morphine was replaced with saline while sucrose pellets were still available upon lever pressing, followed by cue-induced reinstatement of morphine seeking behaviour. Results showed that rats retained morphine SA when sucrose pellets were also available, but they showed binge-like sucrose intake when morphine was removed during the extinction sessions. However, morphine SA did not develop in rats that had previously established sucrose pellet SA. In conclusion, morphine SA developed even in the presence of a potent competing nondrug reward in rats. Adding an effort-based contingent delivery of a natural reward to the standard SA model, this protocol may provide an improved model of drug addiction in laboratory animals.

The Relevance of Rewards in Performance- Based Management Control

This study aims to increase the understanding of how employees in different or-ganizational contexts and hierarchical levels explain and appreciate, i.e. under-stand, their organisation's reward systems. Two different schools of thought have dominated the debate of how to conceptualize the role of rewards in performance management and organisation psychology literature: agency theory and self-determination theory. This study combines these schools and take both monetary aspects into account in line with what is prescribed in agency theory and more non-financial aspects that self-determination consider. The study applies a case study approach based on interviews and publicly available information from five Finnish organisations. The organisations analysed operate in different sectors, have different organisational structures, and use different reward systems. From a careful investigation of the five different organisations, a cross-sectional picture emerges showing the role of reward systems in companies, and their perceived importance as management control tools. The findings show that reward transpar-ency and fair communication are the most significant factors affecting the experi-ence of employees towards performance-based management control system that is used to allocate rewards. Monetary rewards should also be complemented and linked with social non-financial rewards to reach the decent management control acceptance and understanding in the organisation.

Investigating the cognitive and affective dynamics of social media addiction: Insights from peer contexts.

Informed by the interaction of person-affect-cognition-execution (I-PACE) theory, the present studies examined the association between peer rejection, peer popularity, and social media addiction (SMA) at both between-person and within-person levels. Two distinct processes, the fear-driven/compensation-seeking process and the reward-driven process were explored. In Study 1, using a cross-sectional sample of high school students (N = 318), both processes were supported via different cognitive mediators. Support for the fear-driven/compensation-seeking process was demonstrated by finding that avoidance expectancy was a significant cognitive mediator between peer-nominated rejection and SMA. In turn, the reward-driven process was supported by the significant mediation of reward expectancy between peer-nominated popularity and SMA. In Study 2, using ecological momentary assessment with college students (N = 54), we found the fear-driven/compensation-seeking process partially supported through both between-person and within-person mediations. Specifically, negative affect and social media craving were two affective mediators that linked peer rejection and addictive social media use behaviors. On the other hand, the reward-driven process was predominantly supported by within-person mediations, in which positive affect and social media craving were found to be mediators of the relationship between peer popularity and addictive social media use behaviors. The results underscore that adolescents experiencing rejection tend to use social media to avoid negative feelings and compensate for interpersonal deficits, while adolescents experiencing popularity tend to use social media to maintain positive feelings and gain social rewards. Implications for the assessment, case formulation, and treatment of SMA in counseling practice are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Longitudinal relations between parenting practices and prosocial behaviors in recent immigrant Latino/a adolescents: Familism values and ethnic identity as mediators

IntroductionThe present study investigated the mediating roles of familism values and ethnic identity in longitudinal associations between recent immigrant U.S. Latino/a adolescents' reports of their parents' (i.e., mothers' and fathers') use of social and material rewards and prosocial behaviors.MethodsParticipants included 302 recent immigrant U.S. Latino/a adolescents (M age = 14.5 years at Time 1, range = 13–17 years, 53% male) recruited from Los Angeles and Miami. Participants self-reported on their perceptions of parents' use of social and material rewards (Time 1), familism values (Time 3), ethnic identity (Time 5), and multiple types of prosocial behaviors (Time 6).ResultsPath analyses showed that mothers' use of social rewards was indirectly related (via familism values and ethnic identity) to higher levels of everyday types of helping behaviors seen in youth, whereas mothers' use of material rewards was only directly related to motive-based helping behaviors. In contrast, we found no significant direct or indirect relations from fathers' use of social or material rewards and prosocial behaviors.DiscussionThe discussion describes the parenting and cultural assets that facilitate varied types and motives of prosocial behaviors in recent immigrant U.S. Latino/a youth. Family-based interventions, prosocial development theories, and future research on this topic can target prosocial parenting practices (e.g., social rewards) and cultural assets (e.g., familism values, ethnic identity) to facilitate helping in youth.

“Balancing work and movement”: barriers and enablers for being physically active at Indian workplaces – findings from SMART STEP trial

BackgroundNon-communicable diseases are rising rapidly in low- and middle-income countries, leading to increased morbidity and mortality. Reducing sedentary behavior (SB) and increasing physical activity (PA) offer numerous health benefits. Workplaces provide an ideal setting for promoting SB/PA interventions; however, understanding the barriers and enablers is crucial for optimizing these interventions in workplace environments.MethodsNested within a cluster randomised controlled trial (the SMART-STEP trial), the present study employed in-depth interviews with 16 office workers who have completed 24 weeks of two distinct (technology assisted and traditional) workplace SB/PA interventions. Using a deductive analysis, semi-structured interviews were administered to explore the barriers and enablers to the SB/PA interventions at individual, interpersonal and organisational level using the socio-ecological model.ResultsSeveral individual (poor goal setting, perceived health benefits & workload, attitude, intervention engagement), interpersonal (lack of peer support) and organisational (task prioritisation, lack of organisational norm and material or social reward) barriers were identified. Indian women engaged in desk-based office jobs often find themselves burdened with intense home and childcare responsibilities, often without sufficient support from their spouses. A primary concern among Indian office workers is the poor awareness and absence of cultural norms regarding the health risks associated with SB.ConclusionsRaising awareness among workplace stakeholders—including office workers, peers, and the organization—is crucial before designing and implementing SB/PA interventions in Indian workspaces. Personalized interventions for Indian female office workers engaged in desk-bound work are warranted.

Blunted reward-related activation to food scenes distinguishes individuals with alcohol use disorder in a pilot case-control fMRI pilot study.

Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is thought to bias the neurocircuitry underlying reward processing and motivation to preferentially attend to conditioned alcohol cues over natural rewards. The present case-control pilot study evaluated this hypothesis using novel natural reward paradigms. Twenty-eight participants (AUD, n = 14, light drinkers, n = 14) were recruited-AUD participants reported 44.0% heavy drinking days (%HDD) and 4.67 drinks/day over the preceding 90 days. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data were acquired during the administration of three separate picture-viewing paradigms of alcohol cues, food scenes, and social reward, respectively. Independent samples t-tests were performed to compare groups' fMRI data and exploratory correlation analyses were performed to examine associations with clinical characteristics of AUD. Food scenes elicited abnormally low reward-related activation, within the superior frontal gyrus and caudate bilaterally, among AUD participants. Lower activation to food scenes within the superior frontal gyrus was, in turn, associated with higher levels of past-month %HDD among AUD participants, specifically, along with craving and alcohol dependence severity when examined across the full sample. Contrasting reward types (e.g., alcohol cues vs. food scenes) did not reveal "preferential" activation to differentiate groups. Heavy drinking appears associated with reduced responsivity to natural rewards, specifically food rather than social cues. Neural mechanisms underlying the high prevalence of malnutrition among individuals with AUD may involve some combination of blunted approach-related affect and reduced craving-related motivation to eat when food is present, resulting in limited engagement of cortico-striato-thalamic motor circuitry supporting food acquisition. However, given the preliminary nature of this pilot study, such formulations remain tentative until larger follow-up studies can be conducted. From a potential translational standpoint, the ability of promising therapeutics to demonstrate increased responsivity to natural rewards, specifically nutritive reward may serve as a valuable complementary efficacy indicator for future clinical neuroimaging trials in AUD.

Exploring the role of orexins in the modulation of social reward

Abstract Rationale positive social interactions are essential for mental health, by offering emotional support, reducing stress levels, and promoting resilience against drugs of abuse effects. However, not all individuals perceive social interaction as rewarding. Objectives the goal of this study was to investigate whether the modulation of the orexin system can shift passive coping and non-social behavior (vulnerable) to active coping and social behavior (resilient). This knowledge is primordial for stress- and addiction-related disorders, and for other psychiatric disorders involving impairment in social interaction. Methods male C57/BL6N mice categorized into social and non-social groups, received injections of SB334867, a selective orexin 1 receptor (OX1R) antagonist, before the conditioning sessions with a male conspecific of the same weight and age. Results our results from the conditioned place preference test (CPP) show that SB334867 has no effect on social preference in non-social mice, but it reduces their stress levels and depression-like behavior. These effects appear to be due to a higher OX1R expression in the basolateral amygdala (BLA), a stress-related brain area, of non-social mice compared to their social counterparts. Conclusions these data suggest that the orexin system may be a target to alleviate stress and depression-like behavior in non-social individuals rather than to promote social reward.

Social media (self-)governance? A mixed-method study on the content and drivers of work-related social media use

While practitioners question whether employees’ work-related social media use is a blessing or curse, few scholars have studied the content of employees’ social media posts. Moreover, organizations increasingly regulate employees’ online presence through social media governance tools, but research on their effectiveness is lacking. With an online survey among 502 Belgian employees, we quantitatively examined how social media governance affects employees’ online branding behavior. Additionally, we asked participants to share a recent work-related social media post with us, and explain why they posted it. Quantitative findings indicate that employees’ branding behavior on social media is mostly driven by their identification and relationship with their organization. Regarding the influence of social media governance, guidelines and rewards affect branding behavior positively, while a ban and punishments can have a destructive impact through reactance. When we qualitatively zoom in on employees’ work-related posts, these are mainly positive, organization-related and used for organizational promotion.

Assessing social anhedonia in a transdiagnostic sample: Insights from a computational psychiatry lens.

Anhedonia, a reduced ability to experience positive affect and seek rewards, is present across many psychiatric disorders, notably among individuals who experienced trauma. Within the social domain, anhedonia manifests as an altered sense of belonging and social isolation and is associated with poorer clinical outcomes. Yet, mechanistic operationalizations of social anhedonia are lacking, limiting our understanding of the relationship between these mechanisms and affective symptoms. To address these questions, we developed a social reward exploration task which was administered to a transdiagnostic sample of trauma-exposed Veterans (N = 33) while they underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging. The goal was to maximize compliments from two unknown partners, as participants were told these partners selected compliments based on seeing their picture. A Bayesian reinforcement learning modeling approach was used to extract cognitive and neural markers of compliment (reward) exploration. To address these questions, we developed a social reward exploration task which was administered to a transdiagnostic sample of trauma-exposed Veterans (N = 33) while they underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging. The goal was to maximize compliments from two unknown partners, as participants were told these partners selected compliments based on seeing their picture. A Bayesian reinforcement learning modeling approach was used to extract cognitive and neural markers of compliment (reward) exploration. Higher social connectedness (β = 0.51; 95 % CI=[0.11,0.94]) and anxiety (β = 0.57; 95 % CI=[0.13,1.00]) were independently associated with more model-based choices of the partner they anticipated to be most complimenting. In the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (ACC; z = 3.89, p .001) and left inferior parietal lobule (z = 3.96, p .001), neural responses to reward prediction errors (RPE) were more positive in response to compliment relative to non-compliment outcomes. Greater positive RPE ACC activation was associated with lower anxiety (β = −0.51; 95 % CI=[−0.99,−0.10]. Computational approaches to social reinforcement learning can help identify important neurocognitive differences in social reward sensitivity among individuals with complex affective profiles, such as trauma-exposed individuals. Understanding these differences may help develop new prediction and treatment tools for social anhedonia.