Date: Monday, November 10th, 2025, 12:00h-13:00h UTC+2 (CEST)

Speaker: Guro Løseth, University of Oslo, Norway

Title: Stress, relief and social support: the Role of Endogenous Opioids

Abstract: 

Human stress regulation is deeply embodied and often interpersonal: we calm through touch, synchrony, and shared emotion. The endogenous opioid system has been proposed as a key substrate of this co-regulation and the social bonding it fosters – based on animal evidence, yet the role of opioids in human social stress processing has remained uncertain. In this talk, I will present findings from a pre-registered, double-blind, placebo-controlled study testing a neurobiological model that frames social soothing as an opioid-driven “analgesic” process. Real-life friends (N = 258) received either 50 mg naltrexone (an opioid antagonist drug) or placebo before completing three paradigms designed to elicit stress and probe social regulation of emotional and physiological responses: a dyadic stress and support task, an effort-based social motivation task, and horror movie viewing. Across tasks, social support reliably enhanced recovery and buffered stress by increasing positive affect — and these effects were fully intact under opioid blockade. These results challenge the long-standing opioid hypothesis of social attachment and invite a broader view of interpersonal regulation as a dynamic, embodied process that extends beyond any single neurochemical system.

Biography:

A former science journalist who turned to psychology and cognitive neuroscience after realizing that the really interesting questions are better asked on the other side of the microphone. I started working together with Siri Leknes in 2011 whilst still a student at the clinical psychology program at the University of Oslo. In 2016 I graduated as a Cand.Psychol.

In my current work, I investigate the neurochemistry of social reward processing through psychopharmacological studies and psychophysical investigations using self-report and autonomic measures.

I have a special interest in the links between social support, positive affect and resilience, and in building bridges between the fields of social affective neuroscience and clinical psychology. Another of my passions is science communication, and you’ll find links to some of my media appearances and popular science talks below.

Links:

ResearchGate profile: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Guro_Loseth

LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/guro-engvig-l%C3%B8seth-21314872

Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.no/citations?user=tgETlHAAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao

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If you are interested in giving a talk please write an email to: lab.imbody@gmail.com.