Social Comparison Manifests in Event-related Potentials

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Neuroscience
• Social Psychology

Background:

• Social comparison significantly impacts human outcome evaluation.
• The need to belong influences neural responses to social comparison outcomes.
• Previous research has not fully explored the temporal processing of hierarchical social comparison.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the temporal neural processing of social comparison with hierarchical characteristics.
• To identify distinct stages of neural responses during social comparison.

Main Methods:

• Electroencephalography (EEG) was used to record brain activity.
• Participants engaged in a lottery game, comparing their outcomes with two pseudo-players.
• Analysis focused on three event-related potential (ERP) components: P2, feedback-related negativity (FRN), and late positive component (LPC).

Main Results:

• The P2 component showed heightened responses to performance differences compared to even outcomes.
• The feedback-related negativity (FRN) demonstrated hierarchical sensitivity to social comparison outcomes, with an asymmetric effect.
• A larger late positive component (LPC) was observed for significant outcome discrepancies compared to moderate differences or even outcomes.

Conclusions:

• Social comparison involves a three-stage neural process: difference detection, hierarchical evaluation, and motivational salience interpretation.
• Individuals prioritize situations where their performance deviates from the group.
• Neural responses reflect a hierarchical evaluation of social comparison outcomes.