Abstract:

There has been considerable interest in how we ascertain whether an environment is controllable and in the neural mechanisms that mediate this process. An especially acute version of this problem arises when multiple people collaborate toward a joint outcome. In this talk, I will present work that combines a novel behavioural task, computational modelling, and neuroimaging (fMRI) to investigate how individuals establish control in such ambiguous social contexts. I will show that people engage in specific patterns of behaviour – what we term active disambiguation – to determine what they themselves, as opposed to others, control and which outcomes they cause versus those caused by another person. Finally, I will discuss the relevance of these mechanisms for understanding psychiatric conditions such as depression.