What is it that our brains feel safer while we are in groups?

We have seen in the article called "What is Sociology", by my colleague Camille Gaulthier, that technology has influenced sociology majorly. First by the simple creation of social media platforms, that are created in order for people to join and gather around a similar motive: create an account for themselves and socialize with their friends throughout many variants, blogs, videos, articles, messages...

Camille also mentions the fact that due to the popularity of social media, opinions circulate at a high speed, with many people seeing the same thing at the same second. It is uncomplicated to spread your own opinion about a cause, and make other people believe in what you have to say.

Today, I will talk about the science behind sociology. More specifically, the science behind how and why we, as humans, feel safer when we belong to a group of people.

My impression is that, as simple as it is, the more the better. Meaning a human always feels safer when they are in big number. When in a dangerous situation, the human appreciates not being alone, when protesting for a cause, the human prefers to be in a group, in order to be heard... when cooking, the human favors a companion!

But why? Why is it that we don't enjoy our own company? Now, of course, there are some people who long for some alone time. Society and science has decided to put a name on those people, the introverts. But that isn't what we are here to talk about today!

Clearly, others (people) affect our behavior. It has been proven at multiple times that we use the help of what others have decided to do to help navigate our thoughts.

Robert Cialdini, best known for his 1984 book on psychological persuasion and marketing: "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion" found that influence is based on 6 key principles such as consistency, commitment or again authority. However in 2016, he proposed a 7th principle: the unity principle. The more we identify ourselves with others, the more we are influenced by these others. In his book, Cialdini uses the example of advertisers who inform the world that a product is the "fastest-growing or "best-selling". It turns out advertisers don't really need to give us legitimate facts as to why we should buy the product or again why it is best seller. They simply need to tell us that others think so. We, as consumers, use a single hook: Popular is good! Following the crowd allows us to function in an uncomplicated environment, where questioning what you are doing, purchasing, or liking doesn't come into mind, as everyone else is doing the exact same thing. We, as humans, are social beings, we have survived because of our ability to band together. Early humans who formed groups were more likely to survive.

Researchers have identified the part of our brain which plays a crucial role in interacting with others. We have also found out that this region is not only sensitive to the presence of interactive behaviour, but also to the content of the interactions. This means that being social (interacting within a circle of other humans) has been part of our membrane since day 1. We need to communicate in order to feel safe.

It seems like the single brain region which recognizes interactive behavior within other human beings is the right side of the posterior superior temporal sulcus (pSTS).

The pSTS and broader temporal lobe region (blue part on the picture) are known to be sensitive to other forms of social visualisation such as faces and bodies as well as the theory of mind processing - that is, when you are actively thinking about what is going on in another person's mind. These types of social clues are often played out during social encounters. This would further mean that the sensitivity in the pSTS is due to differences in face, body or theory of mind.

From the beginning of time, our brains have been able to identify a face, or a body in movement, interacting with each other. It seems it triggers a part of our brain in order for us to recognize that we are encountering a social interaction. This might be a start to explaining why we favor interactions.

By Ninon Barou