Neuropsychology of social learning

Social learning refers to learning that is influenced by the observation of, or interaction with, another conspecific or its products. Social learning is ubiquitous in our daily lives, so studying how brain dysfunction affects social learning should be subject to intensive research, which is beneficial for both neuropsychologists and researchers interested in social learning. Surprisingly, the neuropsychological study of social learning is almost nonexistent apart from the literature on autism, in which a couple of research groups have had the originality to tackle the question. In this article, we provide a research agenda aiming to bridge neuropsychology with social learning. After defining social learning and its forms and presenting a theoretical framework that details how cognition takes part in social learning, we give an overview of key experimental paradigms that can be relevant to assess patients’ social learning abilities. We end by discussing how these paradigms could be used in the neuropsychological context to improve both the diagnosis and prognosis of patients and our understanding of how social learning works in humans.