Oxytocin and Interpersonal Motor Resonance

• Status: Completed
• Trial end date: 2016-12-01
• Target enrollment: 0
• Participant gender: Male

Summary

Among different social cues from the environment, the eyes constitute a very salient source for initiating social interaction or communication. Interestingly, previous work from our (Prinsen et al., 2016) and other labs demonstrated that direct eye contact between two individuals can readily evoke an increased propensity to 'mirror' other peoples' actions. Particularly, using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), the investigators showed that mirror-motor mapping at the level of the primary motor cortex (M1), also known as "interpersonal motor resonance" (IMR), is significantly increased upon the observation of actions accompanied by direct eye contact, compared to the observation of actions accompanied by averted eye gaze.

With the present study, the investigators aim to investigate the role of eye contact on IMR further, and in particular, explore whether administration of the 'prosocial' neuropeptide oxytocin (OT) can influence eye-contact induced IMR. In general, OT is known to play an important role in promoting prosocial behavior and the perception of socially-relevant stimuli, such as eye gaze. To date however, the link between OT and IMR is less clear.

• Phase: Phase 4
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers?: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Details

• Lead Sponsor: Katholieke Universiteit Leuven; KU Leuven
• Collaborators: Branco Weiss Fellowship; Research Foundation Flanders; The Branco Weiss Fellowship
• Treatments: Oxytocin

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• Male

• Young adults (between 18 - 35 y/o)

• Right-handed

Exclusion Criteria:

• Left-handed

• Any neuro(psycho)logical / psychiatric illness.

• Motor dysfunctions of the hands / arms.

• Any contradiction to TMS research as assessed with the TMS screening list: no pacemaker, implanted defibrillator, ear implant / a cochlear implant, insulin or implanted pump, a neurostimulator or ventriculoperitoneal shunt, any metallic object in the eyes (metallic fragments)