Neural sensitivity to social feedback and adaptations to changing social contexts in adolescence

Adolescence has long been recognized as a period of heightened social concern that can lead to negative outcomes including risk-taking and internalizing distress. More recently however, there has been an emerging focus on identifying how enhanced social attunement can promote social connections and prosocial behavior, enhancing wellbeing. In this paper, we argue that neural sensitivity to social evaluation functions as a differential susceptibility factor and propose a model to test whether neurally sensitive adolescents evidence greater changes in psychosocial function as their interpersonal contexts change over time. We review evidence demonstrating how neural activation to social feedback cues moderates the link between adolescents’ social experiences and adjustment. We situate this work within frameworks that consider how early experience shapes variability in neural sensitivity and highlight the importance of studying sensitivity during adolescence. Further, we identify limitations of current literature, including a paucity of studies examining positive outcomes beyond the absence of psychopathology or risky behaviors and a lack of longitudinal work necessary to fully test differential susceptibility hypotheses. This leads to a discussion of necessary next steps for the field, such as measurement of both stressful and supportive contexts and consideration of the full range of psychosocial outcomes. Ultimately, we aim to inform a line of research that will test the idea that social sensitivity observed in adolescence is not simply a risk factor to be intervened upon but rather a unique attribute of this stage that can be leveraged to promote adaptation to dynamic social contexts and enhance wellbeing.