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Exploring the Relationship Between Social Expertise and Ability to Process Different Types of Abstract Concepts and the Neural Resources Allocated to Their Processing

NCT07112027 · Status: NOT_YET_RECRUITING · Phase: NA · Type: INTERVENTIONAL · Enrollment: 84

Last updated 2025-08-08

No results posted yet for this study

Summary

Social interaction is supported by several brain regions, which are involved in encoding socio-perceptual information, attributing affective and mental states to other conspecifics, and ultimately enabling the orchestration of an appropriate response. In this view, cognitive control mechanisms are necessary to select relevant information, allocate resources, and generate inferences. There is a close link between the mechanisms underlying social cognition and social conceptual knowledge, relating, for example, to abstract concepts such as "friendship". For example, children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) show impairments in social interactions, and also in the ability to use all those abstract concepts that relate to internal states of the individual as well as to interactions between people.

Behavioral studies have shown how experience can impact the characterization of abstract concepts, influencing their personal, introspective, and contextual characteristics. Neuroimaging studies have also reported that, through mechanisms of brain plasticity, experience modulates neural networks shared with non-experts (e.g., by increasing brain volume and/or functional activity), but can also lead to the recruitment of additional brain resources, thus enriching the knowledge gained by experts. To date, the role of different types and levels of expertise in influencing the neural representation of specific categories of abstract concepts, and in particular social concepts, has not yet been fully elucidated.

Conditions

  • Healthy

Interventions

OTHER

Behavioral and MR scanning

After enrollment, participants will be screened on the basis of the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Subsequently, during the single study, participants will be administered a series of questionnaires (Edinburgh Handedness Inventory - Short Form; Evaluation of social related abilities, competences, and traits: Autism Quotient Test, DASS-21, SIAS, DERS, Ekman test; SET; I-TIPI, and conceptual ratings on semantic dimensions (moral, social, political). Then, an MR acquisition without contrast will be performed. Specifically, we will acquire structural, resting state and functional (BOLD) sequences, in the latter case during the administration of a semantic categorization task. The task is aimed to ascertain participants' responses time and accuracy in processing abstract concepts. Participants will be required to indicate the category of each of the visually presented words by means of button press. The study visit will last 3 hours in total.

Sponsors & Collaborators

  • Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele

    lead OTHER

Study Design

Allocation
NA
Purpose
BASIC_SCIENCE
Masking
NONE
Model
FACTORIAL

Eligibility

Min Age
25 Years
Max Age
50 Years
Sex
ALL
Healthy Volunteers
Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start
2025-08-31
Primary Completion
2025-11-30
Completion
2026-02-28

Countries

  • Italy

Study Locations

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Read the full study record

This page highlights key information. For complete eligibility criteria, study locations, investigator contacts, and the full protocol, visit the original record on ClinicalTrials.gov.

View NCT07112027 on ClinicalTrials.gov