How social choices shape when to stay with a friend vs. seek food in mice
Official title: Circuit-Level Computations of Social Opportunity Costs under Foraging Constraints
Funded at Southern Illinois University Carbondale · NIH-11361350 · Data updated 2026-11-12
A study in mice will look at how the brain decides whether to stay with a social partner or pursue food when both options are available.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R15 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | Southern Illinois University Carbondale NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Carbondale, United States) |
| Project start | May 6, 2026 |
| Project end | April 30, 2029 |
| Funding year | 2026 |
| Award (this year) | $546,335 |
| NIH project number | 1R15NS149434-01 |
| Project ID | NIH-11361350 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Ideal candidates are individuals with autism or related social-communication challenges who may benefit from understanding how social decisions unfold.
✕Less likely to help
Healthy individuals or non-human studies may not directly benefit from these findings.
What this research studies
This grant explores how animals balance social interaction with basic needs by studying mouse behavior in a natural social-foraging setting. Researchers will use a foraging task where mice move between a social area and a water area with varying costs and partner histories, while recording brain activity and manipulating circuits. They aim to map how prefrontal and amygdala circuits compute a common timing signal that guides these split-second decisions and test causality with optical tools. The project seeks to create a unified framework linking ecology, computation, and brain circuits to social decision-making. The work could deepen our understanding of social behavior and its neural underpinnings in conditions like autism.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, this work may reveal how social decisions are wired in the brain, informing approaches to support social functioning in autism.
How similar studies have gone: Past work has shown that social decision processes involve prefrontal and amygdala circuits, supporting the potential validity of this approach.
Where this research is happening
-
Southern Illinois University Carbondale
Carbondale, United States Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Demir, Ebru — Southern Illinois University Carbondale
- Study coordinator: Demir, Ebru
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.