Default and executive networks’ roles in diverse adolescents’ emotionally engaged construals of complex social issues

Abstract

Across adolescence, individuals enrich their concrete, empathic, context-specific interpretations of social-world happenings with abstract, situation-transcending, system-level considerations—invoking values, bigger implications and broader emotional perspectives. To investigate neural mechanisms involved in abstract construals vs concrete construals and the effects of emotional engagement on these mechanisms, 65 mid-adolescents aged 14–18 years reacted to compelling video mini-documentaries during private, open-ended interviews and again during functional magnetic resonance imaging. Following calls to diversify samples, participants were ethnically diverse low-socioeconomic status (SES) urban adolescents performing well in school. Participants spontaneously produced both concrete and abstract construals in the interview, and tendencies to produce each varied independently. As hypothesized, participants who made more abstract construals showed a greater subsequent default mode network (DMN) activity; those who made more concrete construals showed greater executive control network (ECN) activity. Findings were independent of IQ, SES, age and gender. Within individuals, DMN activation, especially when individuals were reporting strong emotional engagement, and ECN deactivation together predicted an abstract construal to a trial. Additionally, brief ECN activation early in the trial strengthened the DMN–abstraction relationship. Findings suggest a neural mechanism for abstract social thought in adolescence. They also link adolescents’ natural construals of social situations to distinct networks’ activity and suggest separable sociocognitive traits that may vary across youths.