It has been long known that we humans are a social bunch. We have this innate drive to cluster into groups. The main thrust for this drive is that throughout history we have enhanced our chances of survival by collectively sharing things such as resources, knowledge and workload. Alternatively, behaving in ways that were not acceptable to the group meant banishment through isolation or rejection from the group. In the wild this would have significantly decreased the chances of survival.
As a result, our brains are highly attuned to our ongoing social status and possible rewards or threats to it. In modern times the workplace is one of the biggest social environments our brain experiences. It is constantly providing us with feedback from the social interactions with others. We need to know when things are working in our favour or when our social situation may be under threat.
SOCIAL REWARD & SOCIAL PAIN
Our brain interprets our social interactions through the use of neural pathways and chemical messengers commonly used for pleasure and pain. When we speak of pleasure and pain in relation to the social brain we are respectively talking about social reward and social pain.
For instance, when our brain recognises the potential rewards from a social interaction it releases chemicals along same neural pathways associated with pleasure making us feel physically good. This is a social reward and it can take the form of emotions such as being valued, feeling connected or appreciated. On the other hand when we feel threatened, rejected or unappreciated the same neural pathways that tell us we're in physical pain are activated. This is known as social pain. So our brains are wired in a way that we experience reward during mutual social interactions, and feel sensations similar to physical pain when we are socially rejected or disapproved.
Evolution has equipped us with a highly sophisticated social processing machine that allows us to engage in social interactions while maintaining relationships on an individual as well as a group basis. Because of this our brains don't always operate in isolation to one another. Our brains often trigger a threat or reward response to the people around us and we may not even realize that we are doing this. When you interact with someone at work, it helps to consider what social messages you may be sending and the impact you may be having on their brain.
There is emerging evidence that our social behaviours have evolved along side the neural architecture to support them. The neocortex (the outer layer of the brain) is markedly larger than other primates or mammals of similar size. It comprises the parts of the brain that are involved in higher social cognition, such as conscious thought, emotional regulation, empathy and language. It seems evolution has biologically hard-wired each of us for interacting with others.
SOCIAL IDENTITY & GROUPS
Since we are such socially oriented creatures a significant part of our identity comes from the groups we belong to. One of the major reasons we seek out group membership is to foster our self-esteem. That is, we feel better when we believe we belong to the ‘right’ group and that there are clear and positive distinctions from other groups.
3 STEPS TO SOCIAL IDENTITY
Our social identity happens in three steps. The first step is categorisation, whereby we assign people (as well as ourselves) to a category in order to understand the social environment. These categorisations tell us things about people - Canadian, Norwegian, Buddhist, Atheist, conservative, liberal, doctor, teacher and so on.
In the second step we adopt the identity of the groups we have categorised ourselves as belonging to. If for example you categorised yourself as a Buddhist, most likely you will take on the appropriate behaviours and values of the group. In order to stay as a member you would conform to it’s norms and act and cooperate in ways that are acceptable to the group.
The third step is comparison where we compare our group with other groups. If we are to maintain our self-esteem our group needs to compare favourably to other groups. It is here where cognitive biases can creep into our thinking and cloud our decisions and judgement. (Cognitive biases are inherent thinking errors that lead to faulty decisions and judgments).
One such cognitive bias is known as in-group-out-group bias, which refers to a pattern of favouring members of the in-group over those of the out-group. This means we tend to selectively look for information that reflects positively on the group we belong to (the in-group). At the same time, we will selectively seek information that reflects negatively on groups that we don’t belong to (the out-group). This tends to lead us to automatically think along the lines of ‘them’ and ‘us’. This in turn leads to irrational group favouritism where we are more willing to see our group win, rather than have outcomes where all people end up better overall.
It is very sobering to think just how susceptible we are to these automated biases. If we don’t become aware of our mental evolutionary programming these cognitive biases will naturally sneak into out thinking and trigger the ‘them’ and ‘us’ mentality. Where once there was no animosity there is now a sense of rivalry and the lines are distinctly drawn between groups. This intergroup competition creates a fight for resources and cooperation and communication crash and burn.
TOWARD A UNIFIED CULTURE & FUNCTIONAL GROUPS
In most cases as a business grows so does the number of people needed to help maintain and sustain it. As a result roles and functions become more distinct and sub-cultures will be a natural outcome of that growth. If care is not taken irrational cognitive biases will kick-in as our innate programming starts to protect our self-esteem by creating unnecessary distinctions between ‘them’ and ‘us’. This doesn’t have to be an inevitable outcome.
I have worked with many different types of groups and departments to create a unified culture. Below are the four main-points (each of them could be a blog onto themselves) that I have found help to dispel ‘them’ and ‘us’ thinking and to create a healthy and sustainable social group identity.
THE SOLUTION
- to simply be aware of the psychological phenomenon of social identity and ‘them’ and ‘us’ thinking
- is to make employees feel as if they are part of a clear company mission or goal - that there is a shared identity
- is for people to see themselves as part of a group even if the group is subdivided by function or responsibility and to accept that sub-cultures are a natural outcome of large groups
- to make the conscious effort to cooperate and communicate in order to overcome natural group dysfunctions and biases
We encourage you to share your questions, opinions and comments. Thanks again for taking the time to read our blog.
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