It is essential for social robots to fit in the human society. In order to facilitate this process we propose to use the family dog’s social behaviour shown towards humans as an inspiration. In this study we explored dogs’ low level social monitoring in dog-human interactions and extracted individually consistent and context dependent behaviours in simple everyday social scenarios. We found that proximity seeking and tail wagging were most individually distinctive in dogs, while activity, orientation (...) towards the owner, and exploration were dependent on the context and/or the activity of the owner. The functional analogues of these dog behaviours can be implemented in social robots of different embodiments in order to make them acceptable and more believable for humans. Keywords: dog-owner interaction; social robotics; low-level social monitoring; greeting behaviour; individually distinctive behaviours. (shrink)

Honeybees display a fascinating social behavior. The structural basis for this behavior, which made the bee a model organism for the study of communication, learning and memory formation, is the tiny insect brain. Neurons of the brain communicate via messenger molecules. Among these molecules, neuropeptides represent the structurally most‐diverse group and occupy a high hierarchic position in the modulation of behavior. A recent analysis of the honeybee genome revealed a considerable number of predicted (200) and confirmed (100) neuropeptides in (...) this insect.1 Is this quantity merely the result of advanced mass spectrometric techniques and bioinformatic tools or does it reflect the expression of more of these important messenger molecules, more than known from other insects studied so far? Our analysis of the data suggests that the social behavior is by no means correlated with a specific increase in the number of neuropeptides. Indeed, the honeybee genome is likely to contain fewer neuropeptide genes, neuropeptide paralogues and neuropeptide receptor genes than the solitary fruitfly Drosophila. BioEssays 29:416–421, 2007. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

It is essential for social robots to fit in the human society. In order to facilitate this process we propose to use the family dog’s social behaviour shown towards humans as an inspiration. In this study we explored dogs’ low level social monitoring in dog-human interactions and extracted individually consistent and context dependent behaviours in simple everyday social scenarios. We found that proximity seeking and tail wagging were most individually distinctive in dogs, while activity, orientation (...) towards the owner, and exploration were dependent on the context and/or the activity of the owner. The functional analogues of these dog behaviours can be implemented in social robots of different embodiments in order to make them acceptable and more believable for humans. Keywords: dog-owner interaction; social robotics; low-level social monitoring; greeting behaviour; individually distinctive behaviours. (shrink)

This book is an expanded and revised edition of the author's critically acclaimed volume Nuts and Bolts for the Social Sciences. In twenty-six succinct chapters, Jon Elster provides an account of the nature of explanation in the social sciences. He offers an overview of key explanatory mechanisms in the social sciences, relying on hundreds of examples and drawing on a large variety of sources - psychology, behavioral economics, biology, political science, historical writings, philosophy and fiction. Written in (...) accessible and jargon-free language, Elster aims at accuracy and clarity while eschewing formal models. In a provocative conclusion, Elster defends the centrality of qualitative social sciences in a two-front war against soft and hard forms of obscurantism. (shrink)

This paper considers the justifiability of criminalising anti-social behaviour through two-step prohibitions such as the Anti-Social Behaviour Order (ASBO). The UK government has recently proposed to abolish and replace the ASBO; however, the proposed new orders would retain many of its most controversial features. The paper begins by criticising the definition of anti-social behaviour employed in both the current legislation and the new proposals. This definition is objectionable because it makes criminalisation contingent upon the (...) irrational judgements of (putative) victims, and its often modest preventive benefits come at a high cost to citizens’ liberty and autonomy. The paper then goes on to propose a new definition of anti-social behaviour that would meet these objections: that is, as a course of conduct that causes others to experience serious and justifiable anxiety about the safety of their local community. Whilst this definition identifies a serious form of wrongdoing, its precise scope is inevitably uncertain. The paper thus concludes that we have good reason to use two-step prohibitions such as the ASBO to regulate such conduct, so as to enable the use of the criminal law against it whilst minimising possible concerns of legality arising from the proposed definition’s uncertain scope. (shrink)

In this new edition of his critically acclaimed book, Jon Elster examines the nature of social behavior, proposing choice as the central concept of the social sciences. Extensively revised throughout, the book offers an overview of key explanatory mechanisms, drawing on many case studies and experiments to explore the nature of explanation in the social sciences; an analysis of the mental states – beliefs, desires, and emotions – that are precursors to action; a systematic comparison of rational-choice (...) models of behavior with alternative accounts, and a review of mechanisms of social interaction ranging from strategic behavior to collective decision making. A wholly new chapter includes an exploration of classical moralists and Proust in charting mental mechanisms operating “behind the back” of the agent, and a new conclusion points to the pitfalls and fallacies in current ways of doing social science, proposing guidelines for more modest and more robust procedures. (shrink)

Coordinating behavior is widespread in contexts that include courtship, aggression, and cooperation for shared outcomes. The social significance of cooperative coordination (CC) is usually downplayed by learning theorists, evolutionary biologists, and game theorists in favor of an individual behavior → outcome perspective predicated on maximizing payoffs for all participants. To more closely model CC as it occurs under free-ranging conditions, pairs of rats were rewarded for coordinated shuttling within a shared chamber with unrestricted social interaction. Results show that (...) animals learned to work together with sensitivity to the task and type of partner. Moreover, social interaction and coordination influenced both consumption of the reward solution immediately following a session and preference for cooperation, suggesting that affective states and incentives related to cooperation extend beyond the outcomes obtained. These results support field studies by showing not only how cooperation is performed but also the importance of considering how the behavior of cooperating affects outcomes and preference for cooperating. (shrink)

Successful behavior requires actively acquiring and representing information about the environment and people, and manipulating and using those acquired representations flexibly to optimally act in and on the world. The frontal lobes have figured prominently in most accounts of flexible or goal-directed behavior, as evidenced by often-reported behavioral inflexibility in individuals with frontal lobe dysfunction. Here, we propose that the hippocampus also plays a critical role by forming and reconstructing relational memory representations that underlie flexible cognition and social behavior. (...) There is mounting evidence that damage to the hippocampus can produce inflexible and maladaptive behavior when such behavior places high demands on the generation, recombination, and flexible use of information. This is seen in abilities as diverse as memory, navigation, exploration, imagination, creativity, decision-making, character judgments, establishing and maintaining social bonds, empathy, social discourse, and language use. Thus, the hippocampus, together with its extensive interconnections with other neural systems, supports the flexible use of information in general. Further, we suggest that this understanding has important clinical implications. Hippocampal abnormalities can produce profound deficits in real-world situations, which typically place high demands on the flexible use of information, but are not always obvious on diagnostic tools tuned to frontal lobe function. This review documents the role of the hippocampus in supporting flexible representations and aims to expand our understanding of the dynamic networks that operate as we move through and create meaning of our world. (shrink)

There is a very simple reason why people act the way they do and it is given by the following maxim: Maxim #1: Individuals tend to do the things they are rewarded for doing and tend to avoid the things they are punished for doing. Before you discard this simple maxim as being too simple to be of any use, let me explain just a bit. For a given situation, this maxim puts you one step closer and in the right (...) direction to understanding why people behave as they do. Let us try it on a simple example: Why do government employees waste money? If you want to know the answer to this then see if you can determine how government employees are rewarded and punished. You will then have the answer to your questions and you will find that government employees are just acting according to this maxim -- just as we would do if we were in their place. (shrink)

Although over the past century psychology has gained some understanding of human capacities like perception, memory, and learning, considerably less progress has been made in understanding social behavior. The roots of this problem lie in the fact that the theoretical and methodological approaches historically taken by psychology are more suited to investigating capacities than they are to studying social behavior. Social behavior will only be understood through taking an approach that takes full account of the social (...) nature of humans and the social fabric within which they act. 2012 APA, all rights reserved). (shrink)

Mainstream social psychology focuses on how people characteristically violate norms of action through social misbehaviors such as conformity with false majority judgments, destructive obedience, and failures to help those in need. Likewise, they are seen to violate norms of reasoning through cognitive errors such as misuse of social information, self-enhancement, and an over-readiness to attribute dispositional characteristics. The causes of this negative research emphasis include the apparent informativeness of norm violation, the status of good behavior and judgment (...) as unconfirmable null hypotheses, and the allure of counter-intuitive findings. The shortcomings of this orientation include frequently erroneous imputations of error, findings of mutually contradictory errors, incoherent interpretations of error, an inability to explain the sources of behavioral or cognitive achievement, and the inhibition of generalized theory. Possible remedies include increased attention to the complete range of behavior and judgmental accomplishment, analytic reforms emphasizing effect sizes and Bayesian inference, and a theoretical paradigm able to account for both the sources of accomplishment and of error. A more balanced social psychology would yield not only a more positive view of human nature, but also an improved understanding of the bases of good behavior and accurate judgment, coherent explanations of occasional lapses, and theoretically grounded suggestions for improvement. Key Words: Bayesian inference; biases; normative models; personality; positive psychology; rationality; reasoning; social behavior; social judgment; social psychology. (shrink)

Moral enhancement is a topic that has sparked much current interest in the world of bioethics. The possibility of making people ‘better,’ not just in the conventional enhancement sense of improving health and other desirable qualities and capacities, but by making them somehow more moral, more decent, altogether better people, has attracted attention from both advocates 1 2 and sceptics 3 alike. The concept of moral enhancement, however, is fraught with difficult questions, theoretical and practical. What does it actually mean (...) to be ‘more moral’? How would moral enhancement be defined and would it necessarily, as some have claimed, make the world a better or safer place? How would or could such enhancement be achieved safely and without undue constraint on personal liberty and autonomy? On this subject, a recent paper by Crockett et al 4 investigating the effects of the neurotransmitter serotonin on moral decision-making provides an intriguing scientific basis for examining what might or might not constitute moral enhancement. The study involved treatment with citalopram, a drug that increases the action of serotonin in the brain, and subsequent analysis of participants' decision-making behaviour in two different situations involving moral dilemmas: the well-known ‘Trolley Problem’ 5 and the ‘Ultimatum Game’. 6 The researchers found that citalopram promoted what they call ‘prosocial behaviour’, increasing the participants' aversion to causing direct harm to others: in the first scenario, they were less likely to select the option that required killing one in order to save five, and in the second, less likely to reject unfair offers at the expense of others. The Crockett study is fascinating both for its insight into human behaviour and because it appears to demonstrate that, at least on some accounts of moral behaviour, serotonin may in fact be a …. (shrink)

(1991). Identity and cooperative social behavior: Pseudospeciation or human integration? World Futures: Vol. 31, Cooperation: Toward a Post-Modern Ethic, pp. 95-106.

ABSTRACTBehavioural economics provides a more realistic model of man than neoclassical economics. But ‘behavioural economic man’ likewise has his shortcomings. An important aspect is the neglect of...

Recent studies in the evolution of cooperation have shifted focus from altruistic to mutualistic cooperation. This change in focus is purported to reveal new explanations for the evolution of prosocial behavior. We argue that the common classification scheme for social behavior used to distinguish between altruistic and mutualistic cooperation is flawed because it fails to take into account dynamically relevant game-theoretic features. This leads some arguments about the evolution of cooperation to conflate dynamical scenarios that differ regarding the basic (...) conditions on the emergence and maintenance of cooperation. We use the tools of evolutionary game theory to increase the resolution of the classification scheme and analyze what evolutionary inferences classifying social behavior can license. (shrink)

There is general acknowledgement that both the anterior cingulate and orbitofrontal cortex are implicated in reinforcement-guided decision making, and emotion and social behaviour. Despite the interest that these areas generate in both the cognitive neuroscience laboratory and the psychiatric clinic, ideas about the distinctive contributions made by each have only recently begun to emerge. This reflects an increasing understanding of the component processes that underlie reinforcement- guided decision making, such as the representation of reinforcement expectations, the exploration, updating (...) and representation of action values, and the appreciation that choices are guided not just by the prospect of reward but also by the costs that action entails. Evidence is emerging to suggest that the anterior cingulate and orbitofrontal cortex make distinct contributions to each of these aspects of decision making. (shrink)

The aim of our study was to investigate the effects of a small therapeutic animal on the social behavior of nine autistic children. The social contacts of the autistic children were evaluated by a descriptive method of direct observation that was performed without and with the presence of a TA. In period one, contacts with an unfamiliar person and acquaintances were registered; in period two, contacts with the acquaintances and the TA were registered. The frequency of contacts of (...) autistic children with their acquaintances significantly increased in the presence of the TA . The frequency of contacts with the TA was significantly higher than the frequency of contacts with the UP . The form of the autistic children’s contacts with A, with the UP, and with the TA was individually dependent, and the presence of the TA changed the characteristics of contacts with A. Our results indicate that the presence of a small TA can positively influence the quantity and quality of the social behavior of autistic children and that the characteristics of social contacts were dependent on the individual. (shrink)

Altering physical actions when responding to changing environmental demands is important but not always effectively performed. This ineffectiveness, which is an error of social behavior generated by mutual interactions, is not well understood. This study investigated mechanisms of a hesitant behavior that occurs in people walking toward each other, causing people to move in the same direction when attempting to avoid a collision. Using a motion capture device affixed to 17 pairs, we first confirmed the hesitant behavior by a (...) difference between the experimental task, which involved an indeterminate situation to assess the actions of another individual, and the control task, which involved a predetermined avoiding direction, in a real-time situation involving two people. We next investigated the effect of three external factors: long distance until an event, synchronized walking cycle, and different foot relations in dyads on the hesitant behavior. A dramatic increase in freezing and near-collision behavior occurred in dyads for which the avoiding direction was not predetermined. The behavior related with the combination of long distance until an event, synchronized walking cycle, and different foot relations in dyads. We found that the hesitant behavior is influenced by an interpersonal relationship under enough distance to predict other movement. The hesitant behavior has possibly emerged as an undesired by-product of joint action. These results contribute to our understanding of the mechanisms of adaptive control of perception-action coupling in mutual interaction. (shrink)

In an era of rising social awareness, both academics and practitioners have been concerned about the effectiveness of pro-social consumer influence strategies. The main assumption here is that for social marketing to succeed one must first understand the factors underlying pro-social consumer behavior. Firstly, drawing on two dimensions the authors first identify four types of social behavior. Next, the model describes social behavior as a result of preceding social behavior motivation and actual (...) class='Hi'>social behavior intention. Norms and economic evaluation have an impact on social behavior motivation, which in turn influences social behavior intention, eventually leading to actual social behavior. Actual control factors, such as the availability of resources and opportunities, decide whether social behavior intention can really translate into actual social behavior. Finally, authors propose message strategies for each type of social behavior. (shrink)

Altruism and cooperation are explained as learned behaviors arising from a pattern of repeated acts whose acquired value outweighs the short-term gains following single acts. But animals and young children, tempted by immediate gains, have difficulty learning behaviors of self-control. An alternative source of reinforcement, shared by animals and humans, arises from social interaction that normally accompanies cooperation and altruism in nature.

Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, EarlyView.

Since its inception, experimental social psychology has arguably been of two minds about the nature and role of theory. Contemporary social psychology's experimental approach has been strongly informed by the “nomological-deductive” approach of Carl Hempel in tandem with the “hypothetico-deducive” approach of Karl Popper. Social psychology's commitment to this hybrid model of science has produced at least two serious obstacles to more fruitful theorizing about human experience: the problem of situational specificity, and the manifest impossibility of formulating (...) meaningful general laws of human social behavior. It is argued that a social psychology based on the search for this kind of lawfulness, under the auspices of either a strict or loose interpretation of the largely Hempelian model, is ultimately unworkable. An alternative approach to social psychology that is attentive both to the need for understanding individual situations and behaviors and to the need for generalized understanding of actual human behaviors is offered. This approach is grounded in the hermeneutic tradition. (shrink)

Introduction, W G Runciman Social Evolution in Primates: The Role of Ecological Factors and Male Behaviour, Carel P van Schaik Determinants of Group Size in Primates: A General Model, R I M Dunbar Function and Intention in the Calls of Non-Human Primates, Dorothy L Cheney & Robert M Seyfarth Why Culture is Common, but Cultural Evolution is Rare, Robert Boyd & Peter J Richerson An Evolutionary and Chronological Framework for Human Social Behaviour, Robert A Foley Friendship (...) and the Banker?s Paradox: Other Pathways to the Evolution of Adaptations for Altruism, John Tooby & Leda Cosmides The Early Prehistory of Human Social Behaviour: Issues of Archaeological Inference and Cognitive Evolution, Steven Mithen The Emergence of Biologically Modern Populations in Europe: A Social and Cognitive ?Revolution??, Paul Mellars Responses to Environmental Novelty: Changes in Men?s Marriage Strategies in a Rural Kenyan Community, Monique Borgerhoff Mulder Genetic Language Impairment: Unruly Grammars, M Gopnik, J Dalalakis, S E Fukuda, S Fukuda & E Kehayia The Emergence of Cultures among Wild Chimpanzees, Christophe Boesch Terrestriality, Bipedalism and the Origin of Language, Leslie C Aiello Conclusions, John Maynard Smith. (shrink)

Emotions play a prominent role in social life, yet the direct impact of emotions on behavior and judgment remains a point of disagreement. The current investigation used meta-analysis to test two theoretical perspectives. The emotion-as-direct-causation perspective asserts that current emotions guide behavior and judgment, whereas the emotion-as-feedback perspective asserts that anticipated emotions guide behavior and judgment. Although the emotion-as-direct-causation perspective was frequently tested, only 22% of tests were significant. Although the emotion-as-feedback perspective was rarely tested, 87% of tests were (...) significant. Our findings suggest that empirical evidence is weak for the default assumption that emotion is the proximal cause of behavior and judgment. Our preliminary findings also suggest that anticipated emotion reliably impacts social behavior and judgment. (shrink)

The aim of the present article is twofold. Firstly, it aims to study the problems arising from the notion of rule proposed by Peter Winch in The Idea of a Social Science and Its Relation to Philosophy to account for all meaningful behavior. On the one hand, it will analyze the problems in the argument posed by Winch in order to state that all meaningful behavior is governed by rules. On the other hand, it will focus on the problems (...) concerning his conception of rules and rule-following, with specific emphasis on pointing out the issues that arise from the criterion posed by Winch in order to determine when a rule is being followed. Secondly, it aims to reassess Winch’s proposal and reformulate, accommodate and define his notion of rule in an intentional account of meaningful behavior, thus solving the problems presented. In addition, it will provide a criterion that allows to determine when a rule is being followed. (shrink)