The four days kicked off with an inspiring pre-congress symposium organized by Claus Lamm on  "Social Neuroscience: how can we bridge the gap from basic research to societal impact?"
From there, we enjoyed excellent talks and lively poster sessions covering everything from the dog brain and human emotions to heat stress, empathy, and predictive coding.

Symposia talks:

• Neural processing of imagery of climate change and environmental degradation by Lukas Mayrhofer
• Uncertainty and heat stress in cooperative decision-making by Arianna Curioni
• Uncertainty and valence in social information seeking about rewarding and aversive outcomes by Meghna Srivastava
• Neurocomputational mechanisms of effortful prosocial motivation across pain and monetary contexts by Claudia Massaccesi
• From self to other: dynamic effects of treatment expectations on empathy for pain by Julia Braunstein

Oral talks:

• Human bodily emotions in the dog brain: discriminating valence and representing happiness by Laura V. Cuaya
• In Amygdala we trust: How the amygdala influences trust learning by Ronald Sladky
• Domain-specific impairments in self–other distinction in borderline personality disorder: Evidence from a multi-center study by Ekaterina Pronizius 

Posters:

• Hot weather, shifting minds: A multi-method approach to heat and social cognition by Moana Drüe
• Does acute heat exposure influence risky decision-making? by Haoyu Nie
• Networks of the social brain. Connecting dog to human social brain function using comparative neuroimaging by Raúl Hernández
• Low affect sharing impairs observational fear learning: different roles for sympathetic and parasympathetic systems by Alexa Müllner-Huber
• Developing a predictive coding task for social cognition: A tool for investigating individual differences in prior-sensory integration by Ece Kurnaz
• How empathy beliefs shape intergroup relations via empathy regulation strategies by Yufang Liao
• State of social cognition research: challenges, future directions, and efforts toward consensus building by Ekaterina Pronizius
• Dogs are not for Eating: Attributing Affective Abilities to Animals by Catherine-Noémie Alexandrina Guran

Beyond the science, networking in Rome was fantastic. We met many inspiring researchers, exchanged ideas, and were reminded how much the ESCAN community continues to grow and thrive. Of course, great discussions were accompanied by plenty of delicious Italian food. We wish we could have stayed longer but Vienna is calling.

We are also very grateful to the FWF and the University of Vienna for making this trip possible through their generous support. Until next time, Rome!