Human children, but not great apes, become socially closer by sharing an experience in common ground

Collaborative imagination synchronizes representations of the future and fosters social connection in the present

From close friends to people on a first date, imagining a shared future appears fundamental to relationships. Yet, no previous research has conceptualized the act of imagination as a socially constructed process that affects how connected we feel to others. The present studies provide a framework for investigating imagination as a collaborative process in which individuals cocreate shared representations of hypothetical events-what we call collaborative imagination. Across two preregistered studies (N = 244), we provide evidence that collaborative imagination of a shared future fosters social connection in novel dyads-beyond imagining a shared future individually or shared experience in general. Subjective ratings and natural language processing of participants' imagined narratives illuminate the representational features of imagined events shaped by collaborative imagination. Together, the present findings have the potential to shift how we view the structure and function of imagination with implications for better understanding interpersonal relationships and collective cognition.

Co-perceiving: Bringing the social into perception

Humans and other animals possess the remarkable ability to effectively navigate a shared perceptual environment by discerning which objects and spaces are perceived by others and which remain private to themselves. Traditionally, this capacity has been encapsulated under the umbrella of joint attention or joint action. In this comprehensive review, we advocate for a broader and more mechanistic understanding of this phenomenon, termed co-perception. Co-perception encompasses the sensitivity to the perceptual engagement of others and the capability to differentiate between objects perceived privately and those perceived commonly with others. It represents a distinct concept from mere simultaneous individual perception. Moreover, discerning between private and common objects doesn't necessitate intricate mind-reading abilities or mutual coordination. The act of perceiving objects as either private or common provides a comprehensive account for social scenarios where individuals simply share the same context or may even engage in competition. This conceptual framework encourages a re-examination of classical paradigms that demonstrate social influences on perception. Furthermore, it suggests that the impacts of shared experiences extend beyond affective responses, also influencing perceptual processes. This article is categorized under: Psychology > Attention Philosophy > Foundations of Cognitive Science Philosophy > Psychological Capacities.

Theory of collective mind

Theory of mind research has traditionally focused on the ascription of mental states to a single individual. Here, we introduce a theory of collective mind: the ascription of a unified mental state to a group of agents with convergent experiences. Rather than differentiation between one's personal perspective and that of another agent, a theory of collective mind requires perspectival unification across agents. We review recent scholarship across the cognitive sciences concerning the conceptual foundations of collective mind representations and their empirical induction through the synchronous arrival of shared information. Research suggests that representations of a collective mind cause psychological amplification of co-attended stimuli, create relational bonds, and increase cooperation, among co-attendees.

A Shared Intentionality Account of Uniquely Human Social Bonding

Many mechanisms of social bonding are common to all primates, but humans seemingly have developed some that are unique to the species. These involve various kinds of interactive experiences-from taking a walk together to having a conversation-whose common feature is the triadic sharing of experience. Current theories of social bonding have no explanation for why humans should have these unique bonding mechanisms. Here we propose a shared intentionality account of uniquely human social bonding. Humans evolved to participate with others in unique forms of cooperative and communicative activities that both depend on and create shared experience. Sharing experience in these activities causes partners to feel closer because it allows them to assess their partner's cooperative competence and motivation toward them and because the shared representations created during such interactions make subsequent cooperative interactions easier and more effective.

Give Me a Straight Answer: Response Ambiguity Diminishes Likability

Across nine experiments (eight preregistered) involving Western and Asian samples, we showed that people providing ambiguous (vs. specific) responses to questions in various social scenarios are seen as less likable. This is because, depending on the social context, response ambiguity may be interpreted as a way to conceal the truth and as a sign of social disinterest. Consequently, people reported lower inclination to befriend or date individuals who appeared to provide ambiguous responses. We also identified situations in which response ambiguity does not harm likability, such as when the questions are sensitive and the responder may need to "soften the blow." A final exploratory study showed that response ambiguity also impacts personality perceptions-individuals providing ambiguous responses are judged as less warm, less extraverted, less gullible, and more cautious. We discuss theoretical implications for the language psychology and person perception literatures and practical implications for impression management and formation.

Children's affiliation toward peers reflected in their picture drawings

Previous studies have demonstrated that a picture-drawing task can be an indicator of the affiliation children have with their peers. When a child draws himself/herself along with a peer, the distance between them is assumed to represent the extent of the affiliation held by the child toward the peer: the shorter the distance is, the more affiliation the child has. However, some issues remain before the picture-drawing task is established as a way to measure children's affiliation, including the possibility that the instructions might bias the children's responses (Thomas & Gray, 1992), and inconsistency over where to measure in the children's drawings (e.g., Song et al., 2015). In this study, we focused on the above two issues and addressed whether the picture-drawing task can be used for measuring children's affiliation toward peers. We conducted our study in Japanese nursery schools with 3- to 6-year-old children (N = 676), who drew pictures of themselves and a classmate. Teachers rated how much the children had played with the drawn peer. We found that the more a child had an affiliative relationship with a peer, the shorter the distance between the drawn child and peer was when measuring the closest points and the center between the two drawn figures. Our research sheds light on the validity of the picture-drawing task for measuring children's affiliation.

Five-year-old children show cooperative preferences for faces with white sclera

The cooperative eye hypothesis posits that human eye morphology evolved to facilitate cooperation. Although it is known that young children prefer stimuli with eyes that contain white sclera, it is unknown whether white sclera influences children's perception of a partner's cooperativeness specifically. In the current studies, we used an online methodology to present 5-year-old children with moving three-dimensional face models in which facial morphology was manipulated. Children found "alien" faces with human eyes more cooperative than faces with dark sclera (Study 2) but not faces with enlarged irises (Study 1). For more human-like faces (Study 3), children found human eyes more cooperative than either enlarged irises or dark sclera and found faces with enlarged irises cuter (but not more cooperative) than eyes with dark sclera. Together, these results provide strong support for the cooperative eye hypothesis.

The coordination of attention and action in great apes and humans

Great apes can discern what others are attending to and even direct others' attention to themselves in flexible ways. But they seemingly do not coordinate their attention with one another recursively—understanding that the other is monitoring their attention just as they are monitoring hers—in acts of joint attention, at least not in the same way as young human children. Similarly, great apes collaborate with partners in many flexible ways, but they seemingly do not coordinate with others to form mutually obligating joint goals and commitments, nor regulate the collaboration via acts of intentional communication, at least not in the same way as young human children. The hypothesis defended here is that it is precisely in their capacities to coordinate attention and action with others—that is, in their capacities for shared intentionality—that humans are most clearly distinguished from other great apes.

This article is part of the theme issue ‘Revisiting the human ‘interaction engine’: comparative approaches to social action coordination’.

Evidence of joint commitment in great apes' natural joint actions

Human joint action seems special, as it is grounded in joint commitment-a sense of mutual obligation participants feel towards each other. Comparative research with humans and non-human great apes has typically investigated joint commitment by experimentally interrupting joint actions to study subjects' resumption strategies. However, such experimental interruptions are human-induced, and thus the question remains of how great apes naturally handle interruptions. Here, we focus on naturally occurring interruptions of joint actions, grooming and play, in bonobos and chimpanzees. Similar to humans, both species frequently resumed interrupted joint actions (and the previous behaviours, like grooming the same body part region or playing the same play type) with their previous partners and at the previous location. Yet, the probability of resumption attempts was unaffected by social bonds or rank. Our data suggest that great apes experience something akin to joint commitment, for which we discuss possible evolutionary origins.