Depue & Morrone-Strupinsky/A neurobehavioral model of affiliative bonding: BBS Call for Commentators

[Behavioral & Brain Sciences]

Below the instructions please find the abstract, keywords, and full text
link to the forthcoming BBS target article:

  A neurobehavioral model of affiliative bonding: Implications 
       for conceptualizing a human trait of affiliation                   
         
                             by
  
     Richard A. Depue and Jeannine V. Morrone-Strupinsky


This article has been accepted for publication in Behavioral and Brain
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                   *** TARGET ARTICLE INFORMATION ***
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TITLE: A neurobehavioral model of affiliative bonding: Implications for
conceptualizing a human trait of affiliation

AUTHORS: Richard A. Depue and Jeannine V. Morrone-Strupinsky

ABSTRACT: Because little is known about the human trait of affiliation,
we provide a novel neurobehavioral model of affiliative bonding.
Discussion is organized around processes of reward and memory formation
that occur during approach and consummatory phases of affiliation.
Appetitive and consummatory reward processes are mediated independently
by the activity of the ventral tegmental area (VTA) dopamine (DA)nucleus
accumbens shell (NAS) pathway and the central corticolimbic projections
of the u-opiate system of the medial basal arcuate nucleus, respectively,
although these two projection systems functionally interact across time.
We next explicate the manner in which DA and glutamate interact in both
the VTA and NAS to form incentive-encoded contextual memory ensembles
that are predictive of reward derived from affiliative objects.
Affiliative stimuli, in particular, are incorporated within contextual
ensembles predictive of affiliative reward via a) the binding of
affiliative stimuli in the rostral circuit of the medial extended
amygdala and subsequent transmission to the NAS shell; b) affiliative
stimulus-induced opiate potentiation of DA processes in the VTA and NAS;
and c) permissive or facilitatory effects of gonadal steroids, oxytocin
(in interaction with DA), and vasopressin on (i) sensory, perceptual, and
attentional processing of affiliative stimuli and (ii)  formation of
social memories. Among these various processes, we propose that the
capacity to experience affiliative reward via opiate functioning has a
disproportionate weight in determing individual differences in
affiliation. We delineate sources of these individual differences, and
provide the first human data that support an association between opiate
functioning and variation in trait affiliation.

KEYWORDS: affiliation, social bonds, social memory, personality,
appetitive reward, consummatory reward, dopamine, u-opiates, oxytocin,
vasopressin, corticolimbic-striatal networks

FULL TEXT: http://www.bbsonline.org/Preprints/Depue-07232002/Referees/


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                *** SUPPLEMENTARY ANNOUNCEMENT ***

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Paul Bloom - Editor

Behavioral and Brain Sciences
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