The Evolutionary Roots of Social Comparisons

2019 ◽  
pp. 462-490
Author(s):  
Marcela E. Benítez ◽  
Sarah F. Brosnan
Keyword(s):  
Animal Behavior ◽  
Comparative Psychology ◽  
Social Comparisons ◽  
Daily Basis ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
Wild Animals ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Social Decisions ◽  
In The Wild ◽  
Social Decision Making

A core aspect of human behavior is that people evaluate themselves in comparison to others in their social group. These social comparisons impact how people see themselves, the decisions they make, and the way they behave on a daily basis. Why, however, are people so focused on relative outcomes, rather than looking at their absolute gains? The answer to this question may lie in understanding the evolutionary roots of social decision-making. Like humans, animals regularly make important social decisions. Studies in animal behavior indicate that, both in the lab and in the wild, animals often make these decisions based on relative outcomes, rather than absolutes. This chapter relies on the comparative approach, pulling from studies on animal behavior, anthropology, and comparative psychology, to explore the evolutionary roots of social comparisons, with an emphasis on spanning the gap between controlled laboratory studies and natural contexts.

Social Decision-Making: Insights from Game Theory and Neuroscience

Science ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 318 (5850) ◽  
pp. 598-602 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan G. Sanfey
Keyword(s):  
Game Theory ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Exchange ◽  
Theoretical Models ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Affective Factors ◽  
Social Decisions ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Competitive Games ◽  
Social Decision Making

By combining the models and tasks of Game Theory with modern psychological and neuroscientific methods, the neuroeconomic approach to the study of social decision-making has the potential to extend our knowledge of brain mechanisms involved in social decisions and to advance theoretical models of how we make decisions in a rich, interactive environment. Research has already begun to illustrate how social exchange can act directly on the brain's reward system, how affective factors play an important role in bargaining and competitive games, and how the ability to assess another's intentions is related to strategic play. These findings provide a fruitful starting point for improved models of social decision-making, informed by the formal mathematical approach of economics and constrained by known neural mechanisms.

scholarly journals Porównanie zasad sprawiedliwości dystrybutywnej

Etyka ◽  
1986 ◽  
Vol 22 ◽  
pp. 153-181 ◽  
Author(s):  
Grzegorz Lissowski
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Welfare ◽  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Pareto Optimality ◽  
Extreme Points ◽  
Optimality Principle ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Social Decisions ◽  
Maximin Rule ◽  
Social Decision Making

The purpose of the article is to draw comparisons between the major normative rules of distributive justice. This comparison is based on a kind of distribution of goods which is sometimes called the problem of pure distribution, i.e. the distribution of a homogeneous, infinitely distributable good in a situation when claims of different persons on the distributed good were in no way differentiated. This problem is defined against the background of typology of problems of goods distribution. Normative rules of distributive Justice are defined formally as social welfare functionals. Eight rules of justice are distinguished: the rule of the utilitarian, Rawls’s maximin rule, Rawls’s lexicographical maximin rule, the maximax rule of the conservatives, the rule of lexicographical maximax of the conservatives, Nash’s rule, and two rules advanced by egalitarianists which differ by the meaning attributed to equality of distribution (equal utility or equal size of the good, accorded to individual persons in result of the distribution). Premises underlying the construction of these rules of justice and which indicate the measurement of preferences and possibilities of interpersonal comparisons are discussed. The same justice rules are also presented graphically. The method of the comparison amounts to examining if a certain set of ethical postulates is fulfilled by the rules under consideration. Several ethical postulates concerning the distribution of goods are formulated. Some of them define conditions any method of evaluating inequality of distribution of goods should fulfil. The remaining postulates involve more general requirements put to methods of making social decisions. Theorems about the fulfilment or nonfulfilment by individual rules of distributive justice of the considered ethical postulates are presented in a recapitulating table. The author demonstrates that almost a1l justice rules fulfil general postulates put to methods of social decision making. Nash’s rule and the two rules of the egalitarians are the exceptions, as they do not fulfil the postulate of separability with respect to unconcerned individuals. Besides, the two rules of the egalitarians do not fulfil the Pareto optimality principle. Significant differences between rules of distributive justice become manifest only when you compare way they fulfil ethical postulates concerning the manner of evaluating the inequality of the distribution. With regard to this set of postulates, they can be arranged along a definite continuum, with Rawls’s lexicographical maximin — the radical egalitarian rule, and the lexicographical maximax of the conservatives – the radical conservative rule as the extreme points of this continuum.

The Neurobiology of Trust and Social Decision-Making

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan B. Engelmann ◽  
Ernst Fehr
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Interactions ◽  
Social Neuroscience ◽  
Neural Mechanisms ◽  
Strong Impact ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Social Decisions ◽  
Social Decision Making ◽  
Economic Considerations

There is accumulating evidence suggesting that emotions can have a strong impact on social decision-making. However, the neural mechanisms of emotional influences on choice are less well understood to date. This chapter integrates recent results from two independent but related research streams in social neuroeconomics and social neuroscience, which together identify the neural mechanisms involved in the influences of emotions on social choice. Specifically, research in social neuroeconomics has shown that social decisions, such as trust-taking, involve commonly ignored emotional considerations in addition to economic considerations related to payouts. These results are paralleled by recent findings in social neuroscience that underline the role of emotions in social interactions. Because anticipatory emotions associated with social approval and rejection can have important, but often ignored, influences on social choices the integration of emotions into theories of social decision-making is necessary.

Trust and Approachability Mediate Social Decision Making in Human-Robot Interaction

2018 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 704-708
Author(s):  
Stephanie Tulk ◽  
Eva Wiese
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Ultimatum Game ◽  
Humanoid Robots ◽  
Human Robot Interaction ◽  
Trust Game ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Economic Decisions ◽  
Social Decisions ◽  
Human Likeness ◽  
Social Decision Making

As humanoid robots become more advanced and commonplace, the average user may perceive their robotic companion as human-like entities that can make social decisions, such as the deliberate choice to act fairly or selfishly. It is important for scientists and designers to consider how this will affect our interactions with social robots. The current paper explores how social decision making with humanoid robots changes as the degree of their human-likeness changes. For that purpose, we created a spectrum of human-like agents via morphing that ranged from very robot-like to very human-like in physical appearance (i.e., in increments of 20%) and measured how this change in physical humanness affected decision-making in two economic games: the Ultimatum Game (Experiment 1) and Trust Game (Experiment 2). We expected increases in human-like appearance to lead to higher rates of punishment for unfair offers and higher ratings of trust in both games. While physical humanness did not have an impact on economic decisions in either of the ex-periments, follow-up analyses showed that both subjective ratings of trust and agent approachability medi-ated the effect of agent appearance on decision-making in both experiments. Possible consequences of these findings for human-robot interactions are discussed.

A neurobiological basis for decision making in language pragmatics

1999 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 283-311 ◽  
Author(s):  
John H. Schumann
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Nervous System ◽  
Social Cognition ◽  
Affect Regulation ◽  
Orbitofrontal Cortex ◽  
The Body ◽  
Conversational Interaction ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Social Decisions ◽  
Social Decision Making

In the nervous system, the orbitofrontal cortex, the amygdala, and the body proper are involved in personal and social decision making. Since normal conversational interaction involves making personal and social decisions on a moment to moment basis about what to say and how to say it, it is proposed that these areas of the nervous system, which subserve stimulus appraisal, attachment, affect regulation, and social cognition, also subserve decision making in language pragmatics.

scholarly journals Breaking human social decision making into multiple components and then putting them together again

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shinsuke Suzuki ◽  
John O'Doherty
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Behavior Modeling ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Social Decisions ◽  
Internal States ◽  
Neural Computations ◽  
Neuroimaging Data ◽  
Social Decision Making

Most of our waking time as human beings is spent interacting with other individuals. In order to make good decisions in this social milieu, it is often necessary to make inferences about the internal states, traits and intentions of others. Recently, some progress has been made to uncover the neural computations underlying human social decision-making by combining functional magnetic resonance neuroimaging (fMRI) with computational modeling of behavior. Modeling of behavioral data allows us to identify key computations necessary for decision-making and how these computations are integrated. Furthermore, by correlating these computational variables against neuroimaging data, it has become possible to elucidate where in the brain various computational variables are implemented during social decision making. Here we review the current state of knowledge in the domain of social computational neuroscience. Findings to date have emphasized that social decisions are driven by multiple computations that are conducted in parallel and which are implemented in distinct brain regions. We suggest that further progress is going to depend on identifying how and where such variables get integrated in order to yield a coherent behavioral output.

scholarly journals Neuronal Circuits for Social Decision-Making and Their Clinical Implications

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raymundo Báez-Mendoza ◽  
Yuriria Vázquez ◽  
Emma P. Mastrobattista ◽  
Ziv M. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Neuropsychiatric Disorders ◽  
Review Literature ◽  
Cognitive Resources ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Economic Decision Making ◽  
Social Decisions ◽  
Neuronal Mechanisms ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Social Decision Making

Social living facilitates individual access to rewards, cognitive resources, and objects that would not be otherwise accessible. There are, however, some drawbacks to social living, particularly when competing for scarce resources. Furthermore, variability in our ability to make social decisions can be associated with neuropsychiatric disorders. The neuronal mechanisms underlying social decision-making are beginning to be understood. The momentum to study this phenomenon has been partially carried over by the study of economic decision-making. Yet, because of the similarities between these different types of decision-making, it is unclear what is a social decision. Here, we propose a definition of social decision-making as choices taken in a context where one or more conspecifics are involved in the decision or the consequences of it. Social decisions can be conceptualized as complex economic decisions since they are based on the subjective preferences between different goods. During social decisions, individuals choose based on their internal value estimate of the different alternatives. These are complex decisions given that conspecifics beliefs or actions could modify the subject’s internal valuations at every choice. Here, we first review recent developments in our collective understanding of the neuronal mechanisms and circuits of social decision-making in primates. We then review literature characterizing populations with neuropsychiatric disorders showing deficits in social decision-making and the underlying neuronal circuitries associated with these deficits.

Social Psychology and Noninvasive Electrical Stimulation

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 30-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paulo S. Boggio ◽  
Gabriel G. Rêgo ◽  
Lucas M. Marques ◽  
Thiago L. Costa
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
Social Neuroscience ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Social Pain ◽  
Substantial Evidence ◽  
Social Decision ◽  
Correlational Research ◽  
Neuroscience Research ◽  
Social Decision Making ◽  
Brain Behavior

Abstract. Social neuroscience and psychology have made substantial advances in the last few decades. Nonetheless, the field has relied mostly on behavioral, imaging, and other correlational research methods. Here we argue that transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is an effective and relevant technique to be used in this field of research, allowing for the establishment of more causal brain-behavior relationships than can be achieved with most of the techniques used in this field. We review relevant brain stimulation-aided research in the fields of social pain, social interaction, prejudice, and social decision-making, with a special focus on tDCS. Despite the fact that the use of tDCS in Social Neuroscience and Psychology studies is still in its early days, results are promising. As better understanding of the processes behind social cognition becomes increasingly necessary due to political, clinical, and even philosophical demands, the fact that tDCS is arguably rare in Social Neuroscience research is very noteworthy. This review aims at inspiring researchers to employ tDCS in the investigation of issues within Social Neuroscience. We present substantial evidence that tDCS is indeed an appropriate tool for this purpose.

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