Hive Psychology, Happiness, and Public Policy

Abstract

We consider three hypotheses about relatedness and well-being including the hive hypothesis, which says people need to lose themselves occasionally by becoming part of an emergent social organism in order to reach the highest levels of human flourishing. We discuss recent evolutionary thinking about multilevel selection, which offers a distal reason why the hive hypothesis might be true. We next consider psychological phenomena such as the joy of synchronized movement and the ecstatic joy of self-loss, which might be proximal mechanisms underlying the extraordinary pleasures people get from hive-type activities. We suggest that if the hive hypothesis turns out to be true, it has implications for public policy. We suggest that the hive hypothesis points to new ways to increase social capital and encourages a new focus on happy groups as being more than collections of happy individuals.Question: What is the difference between society and the sun? Answer: If you really want to, you can stare directly at the sun. But to see society, you must use special glasses. Social scientists generally use one of two kinds: glasses that reveal atoms (individuals) and glasses that reveal networks (groups of connected individuals). Psychologists and some economists seem to prefer looking at individuals. We model people as agents who have beliefs and desires and who act to maximize the satisfaction of their desires given their beliefs. We revel in demonstrations that people sometimes do not maximize, and we advance our sciences by bringing in unconscious desires, discounting curves, and errors in the reasoning processes by which people make inferences from their beliefs.When we put on the atomizing glasses, a research agenda and a humanitarian project appear before us: we must fully understand the JONATHAN HAIDT is Associate Professor and J. PATRICK SEDER and SELIN KESEBIR are graduate students in the Department of Psychology, University of Virginia.

Collective synchrony increases prosociality towards non‐performers and outgroup members

“…All over the world and throughout history, people gather together to dance, sing, march, chant, and make music in time with one another. Such synchronization has often been hypothesized as a key mechanism in the purported solidarity‐enhancing effects of collective rituals (Durkheim, ; Ehrenreich, ; Fischer, Callander, Reddish, & Bulbulia, ; Haidt, Seder, & Kesebir, ; Wiltermuth & Heath, ). Recent laboratory studies have found converging evidence in support of this hypothesis.…”

The Choreography of Group Affiliation

“…Large–scale synchronous behavior—marching, dancing, or singing—can enthuse, inspire, mesmerize, or frighten, and has been part of rituals and traditions across the world over centuries (Haidt, Seder, & Kesebir, ; Vicary et al., ). Rituals bind people together (Whitehouse & Lanman, ), emphasizing group membership and commitment to the group (McNeill, ), as well as facilitating cooperation (Watson‐Jones & Legare, ).…”

Market, State, and Morality: Two Studies of How Left and Right Undermined Moral Motivation in the Swedish School System

“…The majority of individuals in fact does not behave as "economic man", but have strong moral and social preferences, as revealed by a host of studies involving the Prisoners' Dilemma and other types of experimental scenarios (see, e.g., Hibbing and Alford 2004;Bowles 2016). Indeed, people have both the ability and the inclination to suppress selfish behavior in order to form complex societies that presuppose human cooperation (Haidt, Seder, and Kesebir 2008). They also strive for meaning and satisfaction in their work and their endeavors, that have little to do with shortsighted material gain (Csíkszentmihályi 1992).…”