In Sync by Andrzej K. Nowak & Robin R. Vallacher & Ryszard Praszkier & Agnieszka Rychwalska & Michal Zochowski

Author:Andrzej K. Nowak & Robin R. Vallacher & Ryszard Praszkier & Agnieszka Rychwalska & Michal Zochowski
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030389871
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

5.7 Summing up and Looking Ahead

Social interaction is ubiquitous in everyday life, and many of these interactions are geared to perform specific functions (e.g., converge on a common judgment, purchasing groceries, etc.). Each such interaction involves some degree of coordination in service of the action, representing the short-lived formation of a functional unit. People, however, do not form special bonds with everyone with whom they happen to coordinate. For two people to go from superficial social exchange to a meaningful relationship, they must achieve and maintain synchronization in their overt behavior and in their internal states repetitively across a variety of functions—that is, they must form functional units to achieve different goals. In marriage, for example, the partners coordinate with respect to house-keeping, child-rearing, entertainment, and so on. Each functional unit may undergo phases of assembly and disassembly as the prerequisites of goal oriented action demand, but the ability to synchronize internal states ensures that each consecutive assembly process becomes progressively easier. Computer simulations based on this approach confirm that both forms of synchronization—of behavior and internal states—occur and that they are intimately related. In the course of achieving synchronization in behavior, each system adjusts its own control parameter to match the level of complexity in the behavior of the other system.

Mutual influence, represented by the strength of coupling (α), plays a decisive role in how well this feedback loop functions to translate behavioral synchronization into synchronization at a deeper level. When influence is very strong—as when people closely monitor and judge one another, or express promises of reward or threat of punishment—the individuals may quickly synchronize in their actions but do so without establishing a common control parameter. When influence is relatively weak, however, the individuals must adjust their own internal state (e.g., mood, attitude, arousal level) to bring their behavior into line with one another. This suggests that for a relationship to develop and endure in meaningful way, the influence exerted by individuals over one another should be relatively weak.

The synchronization of behavior and internal states between two individuals is a special case of synchronization among people generally. Much of daily activity is not confined to dyadic interaction, after all, but rather involves synchronizing with many other people. The number of people can vary a great deal, of course, from a three-person workgroup to larger groups such as a party, a classroom, a street gathering, or an organization. In many respects, the broader social context preserves features of dyadic synchronization, but they also new aspects that produce new phenomena and may also impose more complex patterns. This expansion of synchronization in dyads to accommodate social groups is the task of the next chapter.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.