52 pages • 1 hour read
Goleman opens Social Intelligence with a personal anecdote about an unpleasant encounter with a security guard, in which the man’s needless aggression left Goleman with a lingering feeling of upset he could not shake for some time. Goleman introduces the concept of “emotional contagion,” a phenomenon in which other people’s emotions transfer to the people witnessing them. This phenomenon operates mainly through the activation of the amygdala, which automatically intensifies our focus and starts scanning for threats at any sign of upset or emotional turmoil from another person. The amygdala is most widely known as the source of “fight or flight” impulses in response to danger, but the amygdala is also very sensitive to perceived emotional threats as well as perceived physical ones. This amygdala response primes a person to experience a bit of whatever emotion they are perceiving in others, be it fear, shock, anger, or joy. Goleman then introduces the intuitive, unthinking system of warning and observation fueled by the amygdala, which he calls the “low road.” Goleman relates a second anecdote about a man who lost the use of his visual cortex, becoming functionally blind. However, he was still able to gauge expressions accurately on people’s faces, even though he could not see them. The amygdala was able to extract information from the signals the man’s eyes were receiving, though the visual cortex could not receive that information.
Goleman then introduces the “high road,” the neural system that methodically and consciously analyzes sensory data to develop strategies for handling the situation. The high road moves more slowly but is much more adaptable and capable of specificity.
Goleman points out that humans, as inherently social creatures, are much more attuned to one another than we might like to believe; for instance, when we see someone experiencing stress, our own blood pressure typically rises in response. Additionally, when we lie, we often betray ourselves with subtle “low road” cues that we have little to no control over.
The chapter opens with an anecdote about a therapist who is not “clicking” with his patient: They are interrupting each other, accidentally cutting each other off, and misinterpreting each other’s meanings. Goleman introduces a second anecdote about a therapist who is deeply connected to his patient: Their “rapport is so thick” that they seem intentionally in step with one another (27), shifting minutely when the other moves, their posture matching. Both anecdotes were part of a study of the sweat responses of both therapist and patient, with their sweat levels being monitored throughout. As the sweat response is directly connected to the central nervous system, it served as an accurate gauge of the shifting comfort levels of both participants.
Goleman introduces another anecdote, this one about a professor who was beloved by his entire department because of his seemingly effortless ability to nonverbally communicate ease, creating an “emotional uplift” in any interaction. That professor later published a “recipe for rapport,” which includes three elements: shared attention, mutual positivity, and well-coordinated nonverbal body language.
Another anecdote describes a waitress who effortlessly matches her customers’ mood through body language and tone, while still another showcases the neural synchronicity between musicians playing in concert with one another. In the latter case, Goleman introduces neural systems called “oscillators,” which reset and fire precisely to coordinate with a rhythmic incoming signal, like the beat of a song or the steps of a dance. Goleman ends by describing the “protoconversation”: a mother communicating with her infant through nonverbal coos and “Motherese,” facial expressions, rocking, and singing. “Motherese,” or babytalk, is surprisingly universal in its high-pitched, friendly, melodic tone, always hitting around 300 hertz regardless of the culture or language of the mother.
Goleman describes a momentary fright he experienced on the subway when he heard a scream from someone outside his line of sight. He became anxious for a second, but upon seeing another man crane his neck to search for the source and then immediately settle back down again and open his newspaper, Goleman felt comforted by the nonverbal communication of the other man.
Goleman then introduces the concept of “mirror neurons,” a neural system that unconsciously mirrors the expressions we see on other people’s faces. He uses the example of a person seeing someone else smile and automatically smiling back without thinking. Goleman describes mirror neurons as a type of “neural WiFi” first discovered in monkeys, who unconsciously imitated the eating movements of other monkeys and even humans, though the monkey being studied had no food of its own. Goleman calls this “primal empathy.”
He next describes an experiment in which strangers were instructed to play silly games meant to look foolish, leading to shared laughter. The strangers forced to be silly together reported a strong sense of closeness, in contrast to a control group of strangers simply tasked with accomplishing a goal together.
Goleman links the idea of mirror neurons to the larger culture of “memes.” He suggests that seeing an idea presented already in a set context, like a meme, “primes” us to interpret that idea in a similar way to the person who transmitted it, creating a cultural synchronicity that resembles the microcosm of two people synchronizing.
Goleman lastly shows the power of mirror neurons in a less pleasant context: that of mob violence. He recalls a violent crowd after a soccer game in a European country. Seemingly without cause and with frightening synchronicity, the members of the crowd began to attack one another and sparked a mass riot.
These first three chapters cover the basic social science concepts that form the building blocks for the ideas presented in the rest of Social Intelligence. Goleman demonstrates his own social intelligence through the liberal use of anecdotes, small informal stories that put faces to concepts and engage readers in accessible, engaging stories before introducing scientific concepts that may be more difficult to visualize. Goleman offers at least three anecdotes per chapter of Social Intelligence. They offer a break from the theoretical or abstract concepts and present concrete, relatable experiences that readers can connect with on an emotional level. By weaving anecdotes into their writing, authors can effectively humanize complex ideas and make them more accessible. Anecdotes provide evidence and support for concepts that otherwise might rely only on statistics or generalizations, which do not prompt empathy in the same way as a personal story. Anecdotes are also more memorable than dry concepts. Finally, anecdotes serve to establish a connection between author and reader by allowing a glimpse inside the author’s life, which fosters empathy as well, allowing readers to feel more connected to an author and more primed to understand their claims.
Through the use of these anecdotes, Goleman defines the concepts of “low” and “high” road neural processing. He describes the different and complementary strengths of the high and low roads, namely that the low road works faster but can be inaccurate, while the high road works more slowly but more flexibly and with greater efficacy. Our “low road” systems are able to collect information and form a judgment in less than 30 milliseconds, or roughly one 20th of a second.
Goleman then introduces the concept of “emotional contagion,” the ability of human brains to rapidly synchronize and spread emotion from one person to another simply through facial expression and body language. The emotions that others experience create similar emotional and even physical consequences for the witness as well. Goleman presents Emotional Contagion as the Basis of Human Interaction, and this claim emerges as one of the book’s major themes. This shows how attuned our “low road” systems are to the humans around us—a feature that developed early in human evolution, when the ability to “multiply sentinels” helped to ensure our survival.
Through a personal anecdote about his beloved mentor, Goleman then introduces the concept of “rapport,” a deep feeling of understanding and friendliness in which both participants feel the warmth of the other’s attention. Voice, facial expression, gestures, posture, and visible emotion all play a part in the creation of rapport. In contrast, negative feelings can also be transmitted through emotional contagion, as shown in an anecdote about a crowd of soccer fans suddenly engaging in violence. This pattern also repeats throughout the book, as Goleman details The Neurobiology of Human Interaction: Every positive, prosocial inclination hardwired into our brains also has a dark side. Anger and violence can spread through “emotional contagion” just as easily as empathy and kindness.
However, rapport, the product of emotional contagion, is still the bedrock of positive social interaction. Goleman points out that from infancy, caregivers and babies engage in a kind of wordless, attuned, synchronized rapport he calls the “protoconversation” conducted in wordless, melodic, friendly noises, gestures, and expressions, made by the caregiver and quickly imitated by the baby. The protoconversation acts as a basic tutorial for human interaction, which the baby can build upon as they grow.
Plus, gain access to 8,800+ more expert-written Study Guides.
Including features:
By Daniel Goleman
Books About Leadership
View Collection
Business & Economics
View Collection
Nature Versus Nurture
View Collection
Popular Study Guides
View Collection
Psychology
View Collection
Science & Nature
View Collection
Self-Help Books
View Collection
Sociology
View Collection
Valentine's Day Reads: The Theme of Love
View Collection