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Impact of Another Person's Presence on Brain and Behavioral Performance

Impact of the Presence of a Familiar Peer of the Same Age on the Behavioral Performance of the Child, Adolescent, and Young Adult and Study of the Biological Correlates by Neuroimagery

Status
Terminated
Phases
NA
Study type
Interventional
Source
ClinicalTrials.gov
Registry ID
NCT03453216
Acronym
SOFEE
Enrollment
112
Registered
2018-03-05
Start date
2019-07-01
Completion date
2022-10-05
Last updated
2025-08-05

For informational purposes only — not medical advice. Sourced from public registries and may not reflect the latest updates. Terms

Conditions

Behavior and Behavior Mechanisms

Brief summary

In a recent study, investigators provided the first neuroscientific data on social facilitation. This neuroimaging study, performed in the macaque monkey, shows a marked improvement in performance in a simple task when a congener is present compared to when the animal performs the task alone. This social facilitation is accompanied by a significant increase in brain activity within the fronto-parietal network of attention. No variation in activity, however, is observed in the cerebral network of motivation. These results argue in favor of the implication of attentional processes in the phenomenon of social facilitation. The challenge now is to determine whether social facilitation is always based on the attention network (whatever the task) or, alternatively, whether it increases activity in any cerebral circuit involved depending on the task performed and the population studied. This hypothesis, which the investigators have named the multi-mediator model of social facilitation, has the advantage of reconciling the attentional and motivational theories of social facilitation, which are not mutually exclusive. This hypothesis also provides an explanation for the pervasiveness (across species and different ages for humans) of social facilitation. The main objective of SOFEE is to gather neuroscientific evidence to support the multi-facilitator model of social facilitation.

Detailed description

The main objective is to study the effect of the presence of others on cognitive performance and its evolution during development by behavioral and neural measures. The secondary objective is to identify factors (psychological characteristics such as personality traits) explaining individual, behavioral and neural differences, sensitivity to the presence of others.

Interventions

BEHAVIORALneuropsychological tests

Part 1: to determine the cognitive capacity, the subjects undergo different neuropsychological tests To determine individual characteristics children, adolescents and adults complete self-assessment questionnaires . Adults spend a semi-directive interview. Part 2: while the subject 1 (S1) is installed in the MRI, he perform behavioral tasks with the subject 2 (S2) (familiar peer of the same age ± 2 years) installed in an adjacent room, alternating periods when S1 is observed by S2 (condition Social) and periods when S1 is not observed by S2 (condition Alone).

Sponsors

Hôpital le Vinatier
Lead SponsorOTHER

Study design

Allocation
NA
Intervention model
SINGLE_GROUP
Primary purpose
BASIC_SCIENCE
Masking
NONE

Eligibility

Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
8 Years to 35 Years
Healthy volunteers
Yes

Inclusion criteria

* Girl or boy aged ≥ 8 years and ≤ 12 years old for children, * Girl or boy aged ≥ 13 years and ≤ 19 years old for teenagers, * Woman or man age ≥ 20 years and ≤ 35 years old for young adults, * French mother tongue, * With the right to a social security scheme or similar, * With informed consent form signed by the legal representatives and the subject, for minors, * Has signed the informed consent form, for adults.

Exclusion criteria

* Known acquired neurological disorders, including epilepsy, * Known psychiatric disorders, * Complications at birth requiring admission to neonatal intensive care unit, * Ongoing treatment with drugs affecting the central nervous system, * Significant hearing impairment, * Uncorrected visual inadequacy, * Left manual preference, * Contraindications to the MRI examination (people using a pacemaker or an insulin pump, people wearing a metal prosthesis or an intracerebral clip as well as claustrophobic subjects), * Refusal of the subject or parents of the subject to be informed of any anomalies detected on the MRI, * Pregnancy for women of childbearing age: the possibility of pregnancy will be ruled out on questioning for inclusion, * Protected persons other than children

Design outcomes

Primary

MeasureTime frameDescription
Behavioral performance evaluationan average of 5 yearspercentage of correct answers and reaction time when performing cognitive number and rhyme comparison tasks in the presence or absence of a familiar peer
identification through Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI ) of brain activity related to the presence of othersan average of 5 yearsComparison of activity in the three populations tested (children, adolescents, adults)

Secondary

MeasureTime frameDescription
Determination of individual characteristicsan average of 5 yearsanswers of self-assessment questionnaires and semi-directive interview

Countries

France

Outcome results

None listed

Source: ClinicalTrials.gov · Data processed: Feb 4, 2026