Neural basis of prosocial behavior

Both humans and animals display prosocial behaviors, such as comforting, helping, and resource sharing, to improve the well-being of others. Prosocial actions across species share core behavioral features and may have common proximate and evolutionary mechanisms. Functional neuroimaging and brain stimulation studies in humans have implicated several cortical and subcortical areas in various aspects of prosocial behavior, including attribution of others’ emotional and mental states, encoding of subjective values, cognitive control, and reward processing. Application of systems-neuroscience approaches in genetically tractable rodent models enables interrogation at high spatiotemporal precision of the neural coding and control of prosocial behavior. This provides new insights into specific neuronal populations and neural circuits causally regulating comforting and helping behaviors. The ability to behave in ways that benefit other individuals’ well-being is among the most celebrated human characteristics crucial for social cohesiveness. Across mammalian species, animals display various forms of prosocial behaviors – comforting, helping, and resource sharing – to support others’ emotions, goals, and/or material needs. In this review, we provide a cross-species view of the behavioral manifestations, proximate and ultimate drives, and neural mechanisms of prosocial behaviors. We summarize key findings from recent studies in humans and rodents that have shed light on the neural mechanisms underlying different processes essential for prosocial interactions, from perception and empathic sharing of others’ states to prosocial decisions and actions. The ability to behave in ways that benefit other individuals’ well-being is among the most celebrated human characteristics crucial for social cohesiveness. Across mammalian species, animals display various forms of prosocial behaviors – comforting, helping, and resource sharing – to support others’ emotions, goals, and/or material needs. In this review, we provide a cross-species view of the behavioral manifestations, proximate and ultimate drives, and neural mechanisms of prosocial behaviors. We summarize key findings from recent studies in humans and rodents that have shed light on the neural mechanisms underlying different processes essential for prosocial interactions, from perception and empathic sharing of others’ states to prosocial decisions and actions.