In the SMU Social and Clinical Neuroscience (SCN) lab, we study the way people think about, understand, and react to other people. In particular, we study social connection in the form of social cognition and empathy, as well as social disconnection such as reactions to interpersonal stress. We do this by examining interactions between biological, psychological, and environmental factors that contribute to individual differences in social processes and mental health.
biological studies
In our biological studies, we integrate social and clinical psychology with neuroscientific methods including neuroendocrine measurement, pharmacological administration, genetics, and neuroimaging. Our main focus is on the role of the neuropeptides oxytocin and vasopressin. This work is helping to understand the complexities of these neuropeptides and how the initial research on oxytocin painted an overly simplistic explanation of its role in human social cognition and behavior (i.e., branding it as the "love hormone").
Current projects in this area address the following questions:
What are the neural effects of oxytocin and vasopressin administration on social processes?
psychological studies
In our psychological studies (i.e., without biological measures), we have spent the last several years examining the relation between social anxiety and social cognition, as well as numerous other studies examining self-reported and behavioral empathic processes.
Current projects in this area address the following questions:
Through the use of numerous standardized behavioral assessments of social cognition, we have been systematically trying to answer the question, does social anxiety impair social cognitive processing?
We have also been conducting studies that seek to disentangle the relation between social cognition and several individual differences including dispositional empathy, self-referential processing, and alexithymia. In addition, we have run several studies that try to answer whether empathic processes for people and music are related at the behavioral and neural level.
“Open science is good”
We believe in open science and preregister our studies in the SCN Lab. Have a look: osf.io/r5a4q
SCN Lab News!
Recent Tweets from Dr. Tabak and the SCN Lab
-
RT @molpsychiatry: Advances in human oxytocin measurement: challenges and proposed solutions. By Benjamin A. Tabak et al.… https://t.co/z6SphQ93D9 -
Excited to share our new review on human oxytocin measurement with @GarethLeng, Angie Szeto, Karen Parker, Joseph V… https://t.co/XWVbMlSk45
-
Congrats to @FulfordDr on his promotion to tenure! Dan’s one of my closest friends and I can’t think of anyone more… https://t.co/Lu3dKgyfcE
-
RT @social_brains: This Psych Review paper is the culmination of 30 years of thinking. First with a focus on phenomenology in my coll… https://t.co/cPWc0xDMgw