"Finding that the brain's opioid system can act to ease social pain, not just physical pain, may aid understanding of depression and social anxiety.
The findings, recently published in Molecular Psychiatry by a University of Michigan Medical School team, show that the brain's natural painkiller system responds to social rejection – not just physical injury.
What's more, people who score high on a personality trait called resilience – the ability to adjust to environmental change – had the highest amount of natural painkiller activation.
Over more than a decade, U-M work has shown that when a person feels physical pain, their brains release chemicals called opioids into the space between neurons, dampening pain signals.
"This is the first study to peer into the human brain to show that the opioid system is activated during social rejection," says Hsu, a research assistant professor of psychiatry. "In general, opioids have been known to be released during social distress and isolation in animals, but where this occurs in the human brain has not been shown until now."
Each selected some who they might be most interested in romantically – a setup similar to online dating.
But then, when the participants were lying in a brain imaging machine called a PET scanner, they were informed that the individuals they found attractive and interesting were not interested in them.
Brain scans made during these moments showed opioid release, measured by looking at the availability of mu-opioid receptors on brain cells. The effect was largest in the brain regions called the ventral striatum, amygdala, midline thalamus, and periaqueductal gray – areas that are also known to be involved in physical pain.
The researchers had actually made sure the participants understood ahead of time that the "dating" profiles were not real, and neither was the "rejection." But nonetheless, the simulated social rejection was enough to cause both an emotional and opioid response." BCN
The findings, recently published in Molecular Psychiatry by a University of Michigan Medical School team, show that the brain's natural painkiller system responds to social rejection – not just physical injury.
What's more, people who score high on a personality trait called resilience – the ability to adjust to environmental change – had the highest amount of natural painkiller activation.
Over more than a decade, U-M work has shown that when a person feels physical pain, their brains release chemicals called opioids into the space between neurons, dampening pain signals.
"This is the first study to peer into the human brain to show that the opioid system is activated during social rejection," says Hsu, a research assistant professor of psychiatry. "In general, opioids have been known to be released during social distress and isolation in animals, but where this occurs in the human brain has not been shown until now."
Each selected some who they might be most interested in romantically – a setup similar to online dating.
But then, when the participants were lying in a brain imaging machine called a PET scanner, they were informed that the individuals they found attractive and interesting were not interested in them.
Brain scans made during these moments showed opioid release, measured by looking at the availability of mu-opioid receptors on brain cells. The effect was largest in the brain regions called the ventral striatum, amygdala, midline thalamus, and periaqueductal gray – areas that are also known to be involved in physical pain.
The researchers had actually made sure the participants understood ahead of time that the "dating" profiles were not real, and neither was the "rejection." But nonetheless, the simulated social rejection was enough to cause both an emotional and opioid response." BCN
....for I am fearfully and wonderfully made:
Psalm 139:14
....he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
Luke 4:18
