Being in a crowd bonds people via physiological synchrony

Collective events can generate intense emotions, shape group identities, and forge strong bonds. Do these effects extend to remote participation, and what are the psychological mechanisms underpinning their social power? We monitored psycho-physiological activity among groups of basketball fans who either attended games in-person (in a stadium) or watched games live on television in small groups. In-person attendance was associated with greater synchronicity in autonomic nervous system activation at the group level, which resulted in more transformative experiences and contributed to stronger identity fusion. Our findings suggest that the social effects of sports depend substantially on the inter-personal dynamics unfolding among fans, rather than being prompted simply by watching the game itself. Given the increasing prevalence of virtual experiences, this has potentially wide-reaching implications for many domains of collective human interaction.

Hallucinogens, alcohol and shifting leadership strategies in the ancient Peruvian Andes

In the pre-Columbian Andes, the use of hallucinogens during the Formative period (900–300 BC) often supported exclusionary political strategies, whereas, during the Late Horizon (AD 1450–1532), Inca leaders emphasised corporate strategies via the mass consumption of alcohol. Using data from Quilcapampa, the authors argue that a shift occurred during the Middle Horizon (AD 600–1000), when beer made from Schinus molle was combined with the hallucinogen Anadenanthera colubrina. The resulting psychotropic experience reinforced the power of the Wari state, and represents an intermediate step between exclusionary and corporate political strategies. This Andean example adds to the global catalogue documenting the close relationship between hallucinogens and social power.

Creating New Rural Communitas: The Case of China Taiwan’s Rural Regeneration

Traditional sociological theory explains that a rural community is an enclosed unit. China’s fast modernization and urbanization, however, display a rather different phenomenon, where rural communities are changing into open communities, which face the dual task of rebuilding internal relations and expanding external resources. Based on this background and practical cognition, the theoretical framework of the ‘new rural communitas’ is proposed, which expands the common enclosed relationships in traditional rural communities into new, open co-construction relationships with endogenous power as core, government power as support, and social power as coordination, emphasizing the full cooperation of these three types of power. On the basis of the theory, this article employs the practice of the rural regeneration policy in Taiwan as an empirical case, and analyzes how these three types of power affect and cooperate with each other. Furthermore, interviews have been conducted with local community members, government officers, and social participants in three communities in Taiwan to give examples of three different types of new rural communitas. Finally, several suggestions toward constructing new rural communitas are discussed. Abstrak. Teori tradisional dalam sosiologi menjelaskan bahwa komunitas perdesaan adalah unit yang tertutup. Modernisasi dan urbanisasi cepat yang terjadi di China menampilkan fenomena yang sedikit berbeda, dimana komunitas perdesaan berubah menjadi komunitas yang terbuka yang menghadapi tugas ganda membangun kembali hubungan internal dan memperluas sumber daya eksternal. Berdasarkan latar belakang dan kognisi praktis ini, kerangka teoritis ‘komunitas perdesaan baru’ diusulkan, sehingga dapat memperluas hubungan tertutup bersama dalam komunitas perdesaan tradisional menjadi hubungan ko-kontruksi baru yang terbuka dengan kekuatan endogen sebagai inti, kekuatan pemerintah sebagai pendukung, dan kekuasaan social sebagai koordinasi serta menekankan kerjasama penuh dari ketiga jenis kekuasaan tersebut. Berdasarkan teori tersebut, artikel ini menggunakan praktik kebijakan regenerasi perdesaan di Taiwan sebagai kasus empiris, dan menganalisis bagaimana ketiga jenis kekuasaan ini saling mempengaruhi dan bekerja sama. Selanjutnya, wawancara telah dilakukan dengan anggota masyarakat setempat, pejabat pemerintah, dan peserta sosial di tiga komunitas di Taiwan untuk memberikan contoh tiga jenis komunitas perdesaan baru yang berbeda. Akhirnya, beberapa saran untuk membangun komunitas perdesaan baru juga dibahas. Kata kunci. Komunitas perdesaan, komunitas, regenerasi perdesaan, Cina, Taiwan.

Pre-Roman Libyan Religion

Since its inception, the study of Iron Age North African (“Libyan”) religion has been bound up with European ethnographic accounts of modern Berber practices and mentalities. Analyses are based around notions of “survival” and “permanence” observed in later (Roman, post-antique) material and retrojected as belonging to an earlier stage. This approach is itself drawn from 19th century anthropology, and remains current. To move the study of Iron Age cult forwards, we must pose new questions which recognise that religión is never an ahistorical mentality, but rather is entangled with dynamics of social power and lived experience.

Covid-19 and the Social Construction of Reality in Jordan

Almost all nations are struggling to slow down the transmission of Covid-19 by restricting large gatherings and close social interactions. However, it is not expected that people will stop all social gatherings and interactions voluntarily. This situation requires the construction of a new social reality that compels people to abandon their traditional practices, particularly in countries such as Jordan that have a traditional social order and strong bonding social capital. Nevertheless, Jordan had the lowest rates of Covid-19 in the Middle East during the first four months of the pandemic, because its government used its power to impose restrictions and new regulations. However, the situation has become one of the worst cases in the entire world after the government eased its restrictions. The example of Jordan provides strong evidence that the social construction of reality sometimes requires coercive intervention. Thus, this article reconsiders and extends Berger and Luckmann’s theory of social construction by examining it in the realm of social power. The theory includes three significant processes of social construction: externalization, objectivation, and internalization that should consider the concept of social power to extend the range of its powerful explanation.

Views from the Sluice Gate: Water Insecurity, Conflict and Cooperation in Peri-Urban Khulna, Bangladesh

This chapter explores conflict and cooperation around water infrastructure in relation to contestations over water and land in peri-urban Khulna, Bangladesh. It analyses how these contestations, together with the effects of climate change and urbanization, contribute to water insecurity. These dynamics are explored by viewing the peri-urban space as a hydro-social system where physical infrastructure (a sluice gate), hydrological processes and various actors interact. Through participatory appraisal, stakeholder analysis and social power mapping, we analyse the emergence, manifestations and implications of conflicts, and how power relations influence the conflict dynamics. The chapter further presents the process and outcome of participatory actions for capacity-building of communities to facilitate their empowerment by elevating their knowledge level and negotiating capabilities toward securing water and resolving conflicts. We argue that conflicts and water insecurities of peri-urban communities largely emerge from the absence of their participation in the planning and management of water infrastructure, and their limited capacity to resist changes in the control of water and agricultural land. The chapter concludes that peri-urban communities lack the power and agency to mitigate the impacts of urbanization and climate change, while neither urban nor rural planning processes formally recognize the peri-urban and its specific water security problems and needs. This policy gap leads to increasingly complex conflicts and water insecurities. Success and sustainability of alternative livelihood choices and collective action by marginalized communities depend much on continued advocacy, cooperation among and between communities and government agencies, commitment of a trusted neutral actor, and mutual understanding and respect for each other’s positions.

Adopting Artificial Intelligence in Public Healthcare: The Effect of Social Power and Learning Algorithms

Although the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare is still in its early stages, it is important to understand the factors influencing its adoption. Using a qualitative multi-case study of three hospitals in China, we explored the research of factors affecting AI adoption from a social power perspective with consideration of the learning algorithm abilities of AI systems. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews, participative observations, and document analysis, and analyzed using NVivo 11. We classified six social powers into knowledge-based and non-knowledge-based power structures, revealing a social power pattern related to the learning algorithm ability of AI.

Representation of the Self and Other in Joe Biden's Democratic National Convention Speech

This paper discusses the analysis of positive self-presentation and negative other-presentation in Joe Biden’s speech in Democratic National Convention on 20 August 2020. This research utilizes van Dijk’s Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), in which the main analysis is related to social power abuse and inequality in the social and political context. The main purpose of this research is to find out how language contributes to build both positive and negative representation in the speech. However, the research will only focus on the micro-level approach which consists of macrostructure, microstructure, and superstructure analyses. This research employs a qualitative descriptive method since it involves data interpretation in describing the representation. The result of the analysis shows that Biden as the Self has a positive representation; on the other hand, Trump as the Other has a negative representation. Both negative and positive representation are formed through various tools. Through this analysis, it is hoped that people can be more critical in absorbing the information given by political figures.