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Social Baseline Theory: the social regulation of risk and effort
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We describe Social Baseline Theory (SBT), a perspective that integrates the study of social relationships with principles of attachment, behavioral ecology, cognitive neuroscience, and perception science. SBT suggests the human brain expects access to social relationships that mitigate risk and diminish the level of effort needed to meet a variety of goals. This is accomplished in part by incorporating relational partners into neural representations of the self. By contrast, decreased access to relational partners increases cognitive and physiological effort. Relationship disruptions entail re-defining the self as independent, which implies greater risk, increased effort, and diminished well being. The ungrafting of the self and other may mediate recovery from relationship loss.
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“This theory, which has bases on behavioral ecology and cognitive neuroscience, suggests that the human brain expects access to social relationships that mitigate risk and diminish the level of effort needed to meet a variety of goals (7).”
From Physiological attunement and flourishing: understanding the influence of relationships on health (2025) · cites this paper as [7]
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“It will reduce the frequency of social interaction activity (such as chatting, playing cards, and chess), reduce the possibility of informal meetings between the elderly [81,82], and fail to meet the daily social needs of the brain, thereby harming physical and mental health [83].”
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Laurita, A. C., Hazan, C., & Spreng, R. N. (2019) · Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience · doi:10.1093/scan/nsz010 · Cited by 31
Proctor, A. S., Barth, A., & Holt‐Lunstad, J. (2023) · Lifestyle Medicine · doi:10.1002/lim2.91 · Cited by 35
Sun, X., Yamei, Z., Niu, G., Tian, Y., Xu, L., & Duan, C. (2021) · International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction · doi:10.1007/s11469-021-00661-5 · Cited by 29
Forms and Functions of Affective Synchrony
Wood, A., Lipson, J., Zhao, O., & Niedenthal, P. M. (2021) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-030-78471-3_17 · Cited by 33
Keneski, E., Neff, L. A., & Loving, T. J. (2018) · Social Psychological and Personality Science · doi:10.1177/1948550617731499 · Cited by 28
Interpersonal touch enhances cognitive control: A neurophysiological investigation.
Saunders, B., Riesel, A., Klawohn, J., & Inzlicht, M. (2018) · Journal of Experimental Psychology General · doi:10.1037/xge0000412 · Cited by 29
“…demonstrated that touch increases enjoyment, willingness, and attainment during recreational and academic courses (Legg & Wilson, 2013; Steward & Lupfer, 1987), and it has been suggested that social proximity might boost objective and subjective levels of personal efficacy (Coan & Sbarra, 2015).”
Low Adherence to the Mediterranean Diet in Isolated Adolescents: The Mediation Effects of Stress
Ferrer‐Cascales, R., Albaladejo-Blázquez, N., Ruiz‐Robledillo, N., Rubio‐Aparicio, M., Laguna-Pérez, A., & Zaragoza-Martí, A. (2018) · Nutrients · doi:10.3390/nu10121894 · Cited by 26
“Alternatively, the Social Baseline Theory (SBT), based on a sociobiological perspective, propose an interactive effect between social interaction and human biological functioning [25].”
BackgroundInfluentialThe Possibilities of Aloneness and Solitude
Nguyen, T.-V. T., Weinstein, N., & Ryan, R. M. (2021) · Wiley eBooks · doi:10.1002/9781119576457.ch16 · Cited by 39
Nasiriavanaki, Z., Barbour, T., Farabaugh, A. H., Fava, M., Holmes, A. J., Tootell, R. B. H., & Holt, D. J. (2021) · NeuroImage: Clinical · doi:10.1016/j.nicl.2021.102585 · Cited by 24
Adolescent digital emotion regulation
Hollenstein, T., & Faulkner, K. (2024) · Journal of Research on Adolescence · doi:10.1111/jora.13009 · Cited by 51
Dynamics of the immediate behavioral response to partial social exclusion
Dewald‐Kaufmann, J., Wüstenberg, T., Barton, B. B., Goerigk, S. A., Reinhard, M. A., Musil, R., Werle, J., Falkai, P., Jobst, A., & Padberg, F. (2021) · Scientific Reports · doi:10.1038/s41598-020-80039-0 · Cited by 28
Zayas, V., Surenkok, G., & Pandey, G. (2017) · Social and Personality Psychology Compass · doi:10.1111/spc3.12360 · Cited by 24
I blame you, I hear you: Couples’ pronoun use in conflict and dyadic coping
Meier, T., Milek, A., Mehl, M. R., Nußbeck, F. W., Neysari, M., Bodenmann, G., Martin, M., Zemp, M., & Horn, A. B. (2021) · Journal of Social and Personal Relationships · doi:10.1177/02654075211029721 · Cited by 25
Within‐person effects of inclusion and exclusion on well‐being in daily life
Bernstein, M. J., Neubauer, A., Benfield, J. A., Potter, L. N., & Smyth, J. M. (2021) · Personal Relationships · doi:10.1111/pere.12399 · Cited by 28
Cohen, E. E. A., Davis, A., & Taylor, J. (2022) · Applied Psychology Health and Well-Being · doi:10.1111/aphw.12351 · Cited by 29
“…proposed, such as Baumeister and Leary's (1995) influential social motivational account of humans' “ need to belong, ” Beckes and Coan's (2011) and Coan and Sbarra's (2015) ecological social baseline theory and later extensions to relational affect (Sbarra & Coan, 2018), and Aktipis et al.'s…”
Cameron, C. D., Scheffer, J. A., Hadjiandreou, E., & Anderson, S. (2022) · Advances in experimental social psychology · doi:10.1016/bs.aesp.2022.04.005 · Cited by 27
Attachment security and how to get it
Chopik, W. J., Weidmann, R., & Oh, J. (2023) · Social and Personality Psychology Compass · doi:10.1111/spc3.12808 · Cited by 28
“…a broad framework under which people expect to have access to social relationships and that this access helps people mitigate risk and outsource effort through including others within one's conceptualization of the self, both at the metaphorical and even neurological levels (Coan & Sbarra, 2015).”
Your presence soothes me: a neural process model of aversive emotion regulation via social buffering
Bratec, S. M., Bertram, T., Starke, G., Brandl, F., Xie, X., & Sorg, C. (2020) · Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience · doi:10.1093/scan/nsaa068 · Cited by 29
“In other words, unless additional cognitive processing is required, the presence of a conspecific, especially one with positive associations, is linked with less ‘strenuous’ brain activity, denoting a state of reduced vigilance (Beckes and Coan, 2011; Coan and Sbarra, 2015).”
BackgroundManvelian, A., & Sbarra, D. A. (2020) · Psychosomatic Medicine · doi:10.1097/psy.0000000000000798 · Cited by 24
“When writing about the experience of loss from this perspective, Coan and Sbarra (32) recently noted, “Framed in experimental terms, the end of a relationship represents a move away from our social baseline to an alone condition.”
BackgroundSelf-citation
Metadata
- Authors
- Coan, J. A., & Sbarra, D. A.
- Affiliations
- University of Virginia (US)
- University of Arizona (US)
- Corresponding author
- Coan, James A
- Venue
- Current Opinion in Psychology
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2015-02
- Volume
- 1
- Pages
- 87-91
- ISSN
- 2352-250X (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC4375548
- OpenAlex
- W2022429540
- Cited by
- 313
- References
- 52
- Citations by year
- 2026: 43 · 2025: 26 · 2024: 28 · 2023: 32 · 2022: 32 · 2021: 38 · 2020: 29 · 2019: 27 · 2018: 23 · 2017: 22 · 2016: 4 · 2015: 8
- FWCI
- 2.96
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Current Opinion in Psychology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of Mental Health (R01MH080725)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Attachment and Relationship Dynamics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Endocrine and Autonomic Systems › Neuroendocrine regulation and behavior
- Keywords
- interpersonal relationships, risk, effort, attachment, behavioral ecology, cognitive neuroscience, perception, self-representation, relationship disruption, self and other, relationship loss, recovery
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