Values drive our behavioral choices. Ample research has
explored the cognitive and neural underpinnings of value-
based computations related to decision-making. However,
behaviorally relevant values that we associate with real-world
objects are often not monetary. For instance, social values
associated with specific people are crucial for social
behaviors and interactions. Moreover, understanding and
attributing social values allows for proper evaluations of
potential interactions with others, and can lead to more
beneficial social behaviors and relationships. Learning social
values has been shown to recruit the same systems as reward
values, however how they become associated with specific
people remains to be established. The present study examined
social value learning of other people using naturalistic face
images. We found that before learning, distances between the
faces in conceptual similarity spaces were organized
corresponding to their perceptual similarity. However, after
learning, faces were shifted in a manner that reflected
similarity of their associated social values (generosity).
Furthermore, distances were positively correlated with a post-
learning index of preference to interact with a person in a
future cooperative game. In other words, learned social values
of the faces seemed to influence their representations in
conceptual space, and such representational changes were
related to propensities in future behavior.