The Social Brain Lab (SBL) is a unique research unit that combines the expertise in social neuroscience of the groups of Gazzola and Keysers to unravel the mysteries of our social brain and understand what makes us so social to discover the core of our human nature. To tackle this complex problem the members of the Gazzola and Keysers groups collaborate closely and interactively, sharing resources, personnel, and ideas.

The network map below illustrates the collaborative nature of our lab members’ work with one another.

The collaborative environment of the SBL is essential to unravel the neural mechanisms of social cognition. Social cognition is the ability to infer and respond to the feelings and intentions of others. The brain maps the observable behavior of others onto our own internal representations of emotions, sensations, and actions generated by our emotional, sensory, and motor systems and transform these representations into suitable motor and emotional outputs, which is essential for successful social interactions.

In interdisciplinary teams and with broad collaborative networks, the SBL works on projects to investigate the brain circuits underlying empathy, social cognition, and moral decision-making, making use of a wide range of neuroscience tools. We combine brain imaging in humans used to identify the brain regions and networks involved in social cognition and how they communicate, with cellular measurements of brain activity in animals to reveal the cell-types and microcircuitry that underlie these processes. In addition, we use cross-species comparisons to test the causal role of specific brain regions, processes, and cells in social cognition and behavior. Our lab aims to understand how empathy works, why people’s levels of empathy differ, and how we can regulate our empathic feelings.

For a taste of what our research entails, you can take a look at this animated video explaining some of our research methods:

Our Mission

Our mission is to understand typical social functions and their variations to find new, better, and effective therapies to normalize social functioning for people who experience severe impairments in social interaction. Conditions such as autism, conduct disorder, or psychopathy affect 3% of the population and can have a devastating impact on the lives of the patients and their loved ones. Our lab conducts ambitious fundamental research at the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience to understand typical social functions and their variations through multiple levels of analysis, and aims to inspire new and principled treatments in the long-term to create a more inclusive society.