Community, ostracism, and the need to belong

Could community be biologically necessary? Is community an evolutionary imperative? These questions and more I immediately thought of when I read a report of a study titled The Pain of Exclusion in the Scientific American Mind in the January/February 2011 edition. The report was summarized in Delanceyplace, a brief daily email on interesting non-fiction mainly historic and occasionally scientific topics of interest

Starting with the opposite of community, exclusion, the article states that “ostracism - rejection, silence, exclusion - is one of the most powerful punishments that one person can inflict on another. Brain scans have shown that this rejection is actually experienced as physical pain, and that this pain is experienced whether those that reject us are close friends or family or total strangers, and whether the act is overt exclusion or merely looking away.”

This kind of reaction does have a function:” it warns us that something is wrong, that there exists a serious threat to our social and psychological well-being” and that “belonging to a group was a need - not a desire or preference - and, when thwarted, leads to psychological and physical illness.”

Ostracism may even be critical in an evolutionary sense. “Social exclusion interferes not only with reproductive success but also with survival. People who do not belong are not included in collaborations necessary to obtain and share food and also lack protection against enemies.”

Could it be that the need for community is built into our DNA? Is this the reason for the explosion of social networks, and the adoption of social media and “community”  made possible by the Internet and Web 2.0 technologies? It’s technology-enabled, but it’s just human nature? What do you think?

Comments

[Olivier Le Pord]

I'd say human nature... another interesting reference on rejection: http://healthland.time.com/2011/03/28/the-pain-of-romantic-rejection-like-being-punched-in-the-gut/

[Ray Eisenberg]

Olivier: Hence the expression "gutted." - Ray

[CalebBushner]

I think it reaches something both primal and complex: yes, there's certainly the element of sheer biological self-preservation, but what's perhaps more interesting is how this fundamental exigency has come to be manifest in much more elaborate social contexts. It is telling, I think, that Socrates chose death over ostracism: it's better to cease existing than to be removed from the social body. From that social body's perspective, however, the entire practice of ostracism is a purgative procedure--a "social surgery by committee" of sorts--whereby cutting off the limb is (supposedly) required to save the patient itself. I find myself wondering, however, about how well this line of thinking carries over to Web 2.0 when a Facebook block or unfriend can be resolved with a couple clicks (and an apologetic email), but ancient ostracism took much more to resolve...

[Ray Eisenberg]

Caleb - interestiong perspective and goes to the power of face-to-face versus online. Thanks for the comment. - Ray

[Nike Shox]

A candle lights others and consumes itself.