Section Social Neurosciences

Here a link to our separate website.

In our research group we investigate the following major questions:

• How do people make social decisions? How do people learn about each other?
• Which neural and computational mechanisms are relevant for these decision-making and learning processes?
• How do these processes differ in people with mental illness? How can we develop new diagnostic methods and therapeutic components?

Our research projects combine mathematical modelling of behavioural data, model-based and multivariate analyses of fMRI data, pupillometry, evolutionary game theory, virtual reality, etc.

The principles of "open science" are important to us (e.g. sharing data/code and preregistering our studies).

Funding

The group is largely funded by the Emmy Noether Programme, the TRR397 on the Neuropsychobiology of Aggression, and thee Heidelberg Academy of Humanities and Sciences.

Publications

• In anti-chronological order
• See also googlescholar and ORCID.
• Asterisk * indicates equal contribution.
• If possible, data and code are made online available for recent publications.
• Almost all recent publications are preregistered (mostly at the Open Science Framework, OSF).
• Links to data, code, and preregistrations can be found in the articles.
• Brief descriptions are added for the key publications.

Key reviews (since 2021)

1. Kuper-Smith, B. J., & Korn, C. W. (2023). Linearly-additive decomposed 2 × 2 games: A primer for research. Collabra: Psychology, 9(1). https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.84916
2. Rosenblau, G., Frolichs, K., & Korn, C. W. (2023). A neuro-computational social learning framework to facilitate transdiagnostic classification and treatment across psychiatric disorders. Neurosci Biobehav Rev, 149, 105181. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2023.105181

Key publications (since 2021)

1. Doppelhofer, L. M., Perla, R., Frolichs, K. M. M., Rosenblau, G., Herpertz, S. C., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Estimating and learning personality traits of and from women with borderline personality disorder. Borderline Personal Disord Emot Dysregul, in print( ). In a preregistered study, we use computational modelling to demonstrate that individuals with BPD exhibit pervasive negativity biases in self- and other-evaluations, yet retain intact social learning capacities.
2. Doppelhofer, L. M., Loloff, J., Neukel, C., Herpertz, S. C., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Cooperative decision-making in borderline personality disorder: Insights from a preregistered study using a comprehensive economic task battery. Borderline Personal Disord Emot Dysregul, 12(1), 24. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40479-025-00295-2 In a preregistered study with six experiments, patients with borderline personality disorder unexpectedly showed similar social behavior as healthy controls.
3. Kuper-Smith, B. J., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Loss avoidance during social interactions. Commun Psychol, 3(1), 114. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44271-025-00288-5 In a series of seven experiments (4 preregistered; N_Offline = 197, N_Online = 1653), we showed that cooperative and defective behavior is consistently driven by avoiding losses altogether (loss avoidance), but not by minimizing losses (loss aversion).
4. Kube, T., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Induced negative affect hinders self-referential belief updating in response to social feedback. Emotion, 25(1), 174–185. https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0001426 In a large nonclinical sample (N = 117), we showed that negative affect can hamper the integration of (positive) peer feedback on personality traits.
5. Kuper-Smith, B. J., Voulgaris, A., Briken, P., Fuss, J., & Korn, C. W. (2024). Social preferences and psychopathy in a sample of male prisoners-a pilot study. Sci Rep, 14(1), 8344. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-59066-8 A sample of 35 male prison inmates, who were arrested for severe violent offenses, completed a series of economic games.
6. Frolichs, K. M. M., Rosenblau, G., & Korn, C. W. (2022). Incorporating social knowledge structures into computational models. Nat Commun, 13(1), 6205. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-33418-2 We developed a set of novel reinforcement learning models that describe the mechanism of how humans learn about other persons’ character traits.
7. Doppelhofer, L. M., Hurlemann, R., Bach, D. R., & Korn, C. W. (2021). Social motives in a patient with bilateral selective amygdala lesions: Shift in prosocial motivation but not in social value orientation. Neuropsychologia, 162, 108016. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2021.108016 We used different economic models to characterize individual differences of fairness and related social preferences in a patient with amygdala lesions and large samples of healthy individuals.
8. Kuper-Smith, B. J., Doppelhofer, L. M., Oganian, Y., Rosenblau, G., & Korn, C. W. (2021). Risk perception and optimism during the early stages of the covid-19 pandemic. R Soc Open Sci, 8(11), 210904. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.210904 This was one of the first studies to longitudinally assess the expectations and the subjective optimism of persons in Germany, the UK, and the US with respect to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Reviews

1. Liu, S., Behrens, S. C., Besteher, B., Bilek, E., Chae, W. R., Clemens, V., Korn, C. W., Pflug, V., Richter, A., Selle, J., O'Sullivan, J. L., von Brachel, R., Totzeck, C., & Brandhorst, I. (2024). Structures, aims and needs of early career scientists at the german center for mental health. Nervenarzt, 95(5), 467–473. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00115-024-01631-7 (Original work published Strukturen, Ziele und Bedürfnisse der Early Career Scientists am Deutschen Zentrum für Psychische Gesundheit.)
2. Flechsenhar, A., Kanske, P., Krach, S., Korn, C. W., & Bertsch, K. (2022). The (un)learning of social functions and its significance for mental health. Clin Psychol Rev, 98, 102204. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpr.2022.102204
3. Korn, C. W., & Wolf, R. C. (2021). Negative valence systems in the system of research domain criteria : Empirical results and new developments. Nervenarzt, 92(9), 868–877. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00115-021-01166-1 (Original work published Negative Valenzsysteme im System der Research Domain Criteria: Empirische Resultate und neue Entwicklungen.)
4. Bach, D. R., Castegnetti, G., Korn, C. W., Gerster, S., Melinscak, F., & Moser, T. (2018). Psychophysiological modeling: Current state and future directions. Psychophysiology, 55(11), e13214. https://doi.org/10.1111/psyp.13209
5. Rusch, T., Korn, C. W., & Glascher, J. (2017). A two-way street between attention and learning. Neuron, 93(2), 256–258. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2017.01.005

Publications

1. Schroder, A., Czekalla, N., Mayer, A. V., Zhang, L., Stolz, D. S., Korn, C. W., Diekelmann, S., Luebber, F., Paulus, F. M., Muller-Pinzler, L., & Krach, S. (2025). Initial expectations and confidence affect the formation of novel self-beliefs and their revision. Open Mind (Camb), 9, 1576–1596. https://doi.org/10.1162/OPMI.a.36
2. Garcia-Arch, J., Sabio-Albert, M., Korn, C. W., & Fuentemilla, L. (2025). How the self-concept structures social role learning: Insights from computational models. R Soc Open Sci, 12(9), 250590. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.250590
3. Seitz, K. I., Schouler, N., Hundertmark, J., Wilhelm, M., Franz, S., Bauer, S., Taubner, S., Korn, C. W., Haun, M. W., Ditzen, B., Zimmermann, H., Enning, F., Vonderlin, R., Schmahl, C., Schramm, E., Aguilar-Raab, C., Vonderlin, E., Bailer, J., Bopp, E.,…Herpertz, S. C. (2025). Mechanism-based modular psychotherapy versus cognitive behavioural therapy for adolescents and young adults with childhood trauma experiences: Study protocol for a feasibility trial within the German Center for Mental Health. BMJ Open, 15(4), e090476. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2024-090476
4. Liu, W., Mark, I., Korn, C. W., & Rosenblau, G. (2025). Social context matters-characterizing adolescent cooperation strategies when perceiving the other as a peer versus computer partner. J Adolesc. https://doi.org/10.1002/jad.70025
5. Garcia-Arch, J., Korn, C. W., & Fuentemilla, L. (2025). Self-utility distance as a computational approach to understanding self-concept clarity. Commun Psychol, 3(1), 50. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44271-025-00231-8
6. Mueller, M., Korn, C. W., & Haaker, J. (2025). The effect of nicotine on threat avoidance behaviour in healthy non-smokers. Psychopharmacology (Berl), 242(9), 2111–2121. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00213-025-06789-9
7. Becker, J., Korn, C. W., & Blank, H. (2024). Pupil diameter as an indicator of sound pair familiarity after statistically structured auditory sequence. Sci Rep, 14(1), 8739. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-59302-1
8. Becker, J., Viertler, M., Korn, C. W., & Blank, H. (2024). The pupil dilation response as an indicator of visual cue uncertainty and auditory outcome surprise. Eur J Neurosci, 59(10), 2686–2701. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejn.16306
9. Schnitzler, T., Korn, C. W., S, C. H., & Fuchs, T. (2024). Emotion recognition in autism spectrum condition during the covid-19 pandemic. Autism, 28(7), 1690–1702. https://doi.org/10.1177/13623613231203306
10. Abivardi, A., Korn, C. W., Rojkov, I., Gerster, S., Hurlemann, R., & Bach, D. R. (2023). Acceleration of inferred neural responses to oddball targets in an individual with bilateral amygdala lesion compared to healthy controls. Sci Rep, 13(1), 14550. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-41357-1
11. Rosenblau, G., Korn, C. W., Dutton, A., Lee, D., & Pelphrey, K. A. (2021). Neurocognitive mechanisms of social inferences in typical and autistic adolescents. Biol Psychiatry Cogn Neurosci Neuroimaging, 6(8), 782–791. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bpsc.2020.07.002
12. Esser, R., Korn, C. W., Ganzer, F., & Haaker, J. (2021). L-dopa modulates activity in the vmpfc, nucleus accumbens, and vta during threat extinction learning in humans. Elife, 10. https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.65280
13. Korn, C. W., & Bach, D. R. (2019). Minimizing threat via heuristic and optimal policies recruits hippocampus and medial prefrontal cortex. Nat Hum Behav, 3(7), 733–745. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-019-0603-9
14. Oganian, Y., Heekeren, H. R., & Korn, C. W. (2019). Low foreign language proficiency reduces optimism about the personal future. Q J Exp Psychol (Hove), 72(1), 60–75. https://doi.org/10.1177/1747021818774789
15. Korn, C. W., Heekeren, H. R., & Oganian, Y. (2019). The framing effect in a monetary gambling task is robust in minimally verbal language switching contexts. Q J Exp Psychol (Hove), 72(1), 52–59. https://doi.org/10.1177/1747021818769259
16. Bach, D. R., Korn, C. W., Vunder, J., & Bantel, A. (2018). Effect of valproate and pregabalin on human anxiety-like behaviour in a randomised controlled trial. Transl Psychiatry, 8(1), 157. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41398-018-0206-7
17. Rosenblau, G., Korn, C. W., & Pelphrey, K. A. (2018). A computational account of optimizing social predictions reveals that adolescents are conservative learners in social contexts. J Neurosci, 38(4), 974–988. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1044-17.2017
18. Tzovara, A., Korn, C. W., & Bach, D. R. (2018). Human pavlovian fear conditioning conforms to probabilistic learning. PLoS Comput Biol, 14(8), e1006243. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1006243
19. Korn, C. W., Ries, J., Schalk, L., Oganian, Y., & Saalbach, H. (2018). A hard-to-read font reduces the framing effect in a large sample. Psychon Bull Rev, 25(2), 696–703. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-017-1395-4
20. Korn, C. W., & Bach, D. R. (2018). Heuristic and optimal policy computations in the human brain during sequential decision-making. Nat Commun, 9(1), 325. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-017-02750-3
21. Jeung, H., Walther, S., Korn, C. W., Bertsch, K., & Herpertz, S. C. (2018). Emotional responses to receiving peer feedback on opinions in borderline personality disorder. Personal Disord, 9(6), 595–600. https://doi.org/10.1037/per0000292
22. Korn, C. W., Vunder, J., Miro, J., Fuentemilla, L., Hurlemann, R., & Bach, D. R. (2017). Amygdala lesions reduce anxiety-like behavior in a human benzodiazepine-sensitive approach-avoidance conflict test. Biol Psychiatry, 82(7), 522–531. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsych.2017.01.018
23. Korn, C. W., Staib, M., Tzovara, A., Castegnetti, G., & Bach, D. R. (2017). A pupil size response model to assess fear learning. Psychophysiology, 54(3), 330–343. https://doi.org/10.1111/psyp.12801
24. Oganian*, Y., Korn*, C. W., & Heekeren, H. R. (2016). Language switching-but not foreign language use per se-reduces the framing effect. J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn, 42(1), 140–148. https://doi.org/10.1037/xlm0000161
25. Korn, C. W., & Bach, D. R. (2016). A solid frame for the window on cognition: Modeling event-related pupil responses. J Vis, 16(3), 28. https://doi.org/10.1167/16.3.28
26. Korn*, C. W., Rosenblau*, G., Rodriguez Buritica, J. M., & Heekeren, H. R. (2016). Performance feedback processing is positively biased as predicted by attribution theory. PLoS One, 11(2), e0148581. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0148581
27. Korn, C. W., La Rosee, L., Heekeren, H. R., & Roepke, S. (2016a). Social feedback processing in borderline personality disorder. Psychol Med, 46(3), 575–587. https://doi.org/10.1017/S003329171500207X
28. Korn, C. W., La Rosee, L., Heekeren, H. R., & Roepke, S. (2016b). Processing of information about future life events in borderline personality disorder. Psychiatry Res, 246, 719–724. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2016.07.067
29. Korn, C. W., & Bach, D. R. (2015). Maintaining homeostasis by decision-making. PLoS Comput Biol, 11(5), e1004301. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004301
30. Prehn*, K., Korn*, C. W., Bajbouj, M., Klann-Delius, G., Menninghaus, W., Jacobs, A. M., & Heekeren, H. R. (2015). The neural correlates of emotion alignment in social interaction. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci, 10(3), 435–443. https://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsu066
31. Korn*, C. W., Sharot*, T., Walter, H., Heekeren, H. R., & Dolan, R. J. (2014). Depression is related to an absence of optimistically biased belief updating about future life events. Psychol Med, 44(3), 579–592. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0033291713001074
32. Garrett, N., Sharot, T., Faulkner, P., Korn, C. W., Roiser, J. P., & Dolan, R. J. (2014). Losing the rose tinted glasses: Neural substrates of unbiased belief updating in depression. Front Hum Neurosci, 8, 639. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2014.00639
33. Korn, C. W., Fan, Y., Zhang, K., Wang, C., Han, S., & Heekeren, H. R. (2014). Cultural influences on social feedback processing of character traits. Front Hum Neurosci, 8, 192. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2014.00192
34. Castro, L. R., Brito, M., Guiot, E., Polito, M., Korn, C. W., Herve, D., Girault, J. A., Paupardin-Tritsch, D., & Vincent, P. (2013). Striatal neurones have a specific ability to respond to phasic dopamine release. J Physiol, 591(13), 3197–3214. https://doi.org/10.1113/jphysiol.2013.252197
35. Meshi, D., Biele, G., Korn, C. W., & Heekeren, H. R. (2012). How expert advice influences decision making. PLoS One, 7(11), e49748. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0049748
36. Korn, C. W., Prehn, K., Park, S. Q., Walter, H., & Heekeren, H. R. (2012). Positively biased processing of self-relevant social feedback. J Neurosci, 32(47), 16832–16844. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3016-12.2012
37. Sharot, T., Guitart-Masip, M., Korn, C. W., Chowdhury, R., & Dolan, R. J. (2012). How dopamine enhances an optimism bias in humans. Curr Biol, 22(16), 1477–1481. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2012.05.053
38. Sharot, T., Kanai, R., Marston, D., Korn, C. W., Rees, G., & Dolan, R. J. (2012). Selectively altering belief formation in the human brain. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 109(42), 17058–17062. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1205828109
39. Sharot*, T., Korn*, C. W., & Dolan, R. J. (2011). How unrealistic optimism is maintained in the face of reality. Nat Neurosci, 14(11), 1475–1479. https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.2949 

Preprints

1. Zhang, S., Blank, H., Terzidis, I., Rosenblau, G., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Pupil dilation reflects prediction errors in learning about others’ personality traits. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/0.31234/osf.io/9verk_v2
2. Liu, J., Oganian, Y., Wagner, V., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Does the option to be neutral alter the framing effect? preprint. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/9c7z4_v1
3. Zhang, S., Xue, Y., Ma, Y., & Korn, C. W. (2025). The self-allocation bias – behavioral and neural characterization of a newly identified bias for individual performance and contribution in cooperative tasks. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/cqr5w_v1
4. Kammler-Sücker, K. I., Burghardt, M., Mohr, M., Zhang, S., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Virtual grid aggression tasks reveal intention-dependent cooperation and affective responses to digital agents. preprint. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/yxhzv_v1
5. Schnitzler, T., Perla, R., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Whole-body synchronization in autistic adults. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/74zqp_v1
6. Cahalan, S., Block, S. H., Loughlin, M., Perla, R., Korn, C. W., & Rosenblau, G. (2025). Rethinking the double empathy problem – modeling how autistic and non-autistic groups learn about their own and each other’s preferences. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/8v3nk_v1
7. Czekalla, N., Schroder, A., Mayer, A. V., Stierand, J., Stolz, D. S., Kube, T., Korn, C. W., Wilhelm-Groch, I., Klein, J., Paulus, F. M., Krach, S., & Muller-Pinzler, L. (2025). Aberrant insula activity to negative and reduced learning from positive prediction errors as mechanisms underlying maladaptive self-belief formation in depression. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.05.09.593087
8. Golowin, S., Duncan, N. W., Shaikh, F., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Humans employ more sophisticated decision policies when threat is higher in approach-avoidance conflicts. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/76qdy_v2
9. Garcia-Arch, J., Kube, T., Fuentemilla, L., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Self-utility distance predicts perceived stress and affective vulnerability. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/gh9q8_v1
10. Shlobin, N. A., Beestrum, M., Soutschek, A., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Cognitive biases in physician decision-making: A systematic review. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/7abxt_v1
11. Hu, X., García-Arch, J., Zhang, S., & Korn, C. W. (2025b). Imagined self-related feedback elicits positively biased processing. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/jp2kn_v1
12. Guennouni, I., Korn*, C. W., & Koppe*, G. (2025). The price of dark traits: Strategic exploitation and its limitations in repeated trust games. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/ke734_v1
13. Guennouni, I., Koppe*, G., & Korn*, C. W. (2025). When forgiveness backfires: Rejection sensitivity and cooperative behavior following exposure to adaptive forgiving agents. preprint & submitted. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/df5vb_v1
14. Korn, C. W., Kerzel, M., Redžepović, S., Barros, P., Heinrich, S., Wermter, S., & Gläscher, J. (2021). Cross-modal emotion recognition: How similar are patterns between dnns and humand fmri data? Brain2ai@iclr2021. conference proceedings. https://tinyurl.com/2vmh95vj

Miscellaneous

1. Korn, C. W. (2025). Tools and toys: Impulses for researching and promoting functional social interactions. Athene Magazin der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1. (Original work published Werkzeuge und Spielzeuge: Impulse zur Erforschung und Förderung von funktionalen sozialen Interaktionen) https://www.hadw-bw.de/sites/default/files/documents/Athene_1-25.pdf
2. Steiger, O., Doppelhofer, L. M., Kostova, R., Koch, N., & Korn, C. W. (2025). Personality dimensions in borderline personality disorder - a meta-analysis. poster at DGPPN conference. https://heibox.uni-heidelberg.de/d/df11fb55324a4f319ee8/
3. Hu, X., García-Arch, J., Zhang, S., & Korn, C. W. (2025a). Self-enhancement in artificial cognition: Cross-linguistic and cross-cultural evidence from large language models. proposal for special issue. https://osf.io/g92qj/overview
4. Kostova, R., Rosenblau, G., & Korn, C. W. (2025). How do teens and adults learn about other people? In-Mind Online-Magazin. (Original work published Wie lernen Jugendliche und Erwachsene über andere Menschen?) https://de.in-mind.org/article/wie-lernen-jugendliche-und-erwachsene-ueber-andere-menschen
5. Korn, C. W., & Rosenblau, G. (2020). How do teens and adults learn about other people? Front. Young Minds, 8(563084). https://doi.org/10.3389/frym.2020.563084