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Cited by 202Embodied and Extended CognitionEvolutionary Psychology and Human BehaviorChild and Animal Learning Development

The sense of should: A biologically-based framework for modeling social pressure

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Theriault, Jordan E., Young, Liane, Barrett, Lisa Feldman·2021·Physics of Life Reviews
DOI 10.1016/j.plrev.2020.01.004PMC PMC8645214

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Abstract

What is social pressure, and how could it be adaptive to conform to others' expectations? Existing accounts highlight the importance of reputation and social sanctions. Yet, conformist behavior is multiply determined: sometimes, a person desires social regard, but at other times she feels obligated to behave a certain way, regardless of any reputational benefit-i.e. she feels a sense of should. We develop a formal model of this sense of should, beginning from a minimal set of biological premises: that the brain is predictive, that prediction error has a metabolic cost, and that metabolic costs are prospectively avoided. It follows that unpredictable environments impose metabolic costs, and in social environments these costs can be reduced by conforming to others' expectations. We elaborate on a sense of should's benefits and subjective experience, its likely developmental trajectory, and its relation to embodied mental inference. From this individualistic metabolic strategy, the emergent dynamics unify social phenomenon ranging from status quo biases, to communication and motivated cognition. We offer new solutions to long-studied problems (e.g. altruistic behavior), and show how compliance with arbitrary social practices is compelled without explicit sanctions. Social pressure may provide a foundation in individuals on which societies can be built.

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  • Sociocultural and environmental factors transmit emotion concepts to new generations as a tool for regulating the body and each other.

    “In this way, sociocultural and environmental factors transmit emotion concepts to the new generations as a tool for regulating the body and each other.50,51,[154][155][156]”

    From A new science of emotion: implications for functional neurological disorder (2022) · cites this paper as [154]

    The section on culture and norms says social expectations propagate across generations, and the biological-foundations section describes the brain as regulating the body and social behavior as making others more predictable. The Introduction also discusses categorization in emotion, but the paper does not say that sociocultural factors transmit emotion concepts to new generations as a tool for regulating bodies and one another. Page numbers are unavailable in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.82)

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2 of the 349 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Research works printed but not linked: 8

  1. Asch S. (1962). Social psychology (7th ed.). Prentice-Hall. (Original work published 1952)
  2. Clark-Polner E, Wager TD, Satpute AB, & Barrett B, Lisa Feldman. (2016). Neural fingerprinting: Meta-analysis, variation and the search for brain-based essences in the science of emotion. In Barrett LF, Lewis M, & Haviland-Jones JM (Eds.), The handbook of emotion (4th ed., pp. 146– 65). Guilford.
  3. Dawkins R. (2016). The selfish gene: 40th anniversary edition. Oxford University Press. (Original work published 1976)
  4. Fiske AP, & Rai TS (2014). Virtuous Violence. Cambridge University Press.
  5. Moreno A, & Lasa A. (2003). From basic adaptivity to early mind: The origin and evolution of cognitive capacities. Evolution and Cognition, 9(1), 12– 30.
  6. Trivers RL (2016). Foreword. In Dawkins R. (Ed.), The Selfish Gene: 40th Anniversary edition. Oxford University Press. (Original work published 1976)
  7. Uttal WR (2001). The New Phrenology: The Limits of Localizing Cognitive Processes in the Brain. MIT Press.
  8. von Helmholtz H. (1910). Treatise on Physiological Optics: Vol. III (Southall JPC, Ed.; 3rd ed.). Leopold Voss. http://echo.mpiwgberlin.mpg.de/ECHOdocuView?url=/permanent/library/HS7FH69N/pageimg&viewMode=image&mode=imagepath&pn=7 (Original work published 1867)

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Authors
Theriault, J. E., Young, L., & Barrett, L. F.
Affiliations
  • Northeastern University (US)
  • Boston College (US)
Corresponding author
Theriault, Jordan E.
ORCID
Venue
Physics of Life Reviews
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2021-03
Volume
36
Pages
100-136
ISSN
1571-0645 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1016/j.plrev.2020.01.004
PMC
PMC8645214
OpenAlex
W3002114662
Cited by
201
References
349
Citations by year
2026: 13 · 2025: 34 · 2024: 30 · 2023: 30 · 2022: 29 · 2021: 18 · 2020: 45 · 2019: 2
FWCI
4.12
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Physics of Life Reviews (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
  • PsyArXiv (OSF Preprints) (submittedVersion)
  • PsyArXiv (OSF Preprints) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
Funders
National Institutes of Health
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Embodied and Extended Cognition
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
Keywords
social pressure, conformity, social expectations, metabolic cost, prediction error, predictive brain, social sanctions, reputation, status quo bias, motivated cognition, altruism
MeSH terms
Altruism, Brain, Cognition, Emotions, Female, Humans, Interpersonal Relations, Social Behavior

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