The Nature Of The Social Brain

It is truly astonishing how much the social brain affects the way that we (humans) behave and interact with each other and the world around us. The “social brain” is the part our nature that causes us to want and need to connect and to have social bonds with other humans. According to the textbook “Social Psychology and Human Nature” by Roy. F Baumeister and Brad J. Bushman; a study showed that although humans are not the only animal species that are social creatures and have social brains, there was a link between brain-size and the capacity to have a more complex social connections. Furthermore, as humans, our social capacities are more complex in that we also are “cultural animals” meaning we develop culture and cultural connections in …show more content…
Because this is a part of our nature, it is something we do almost without realizing it, even though most of the time we invest hard work toward this end! In my own life, I can see how my social brain affects almost everything that I do on a daily basis. Even my reasons for working at my job and studying ultimately boil down to social reasons; I want to be successful and make money, not just to have money itself, but because making a living is a big part of fitting into society and the culture where I live. If I did not get up every morning and go to work, I would probably lose my job, if I didn’t have a job, I wouldn’t be able to pay for food or rent, meaning I may end up homeless -- and if that were the case, I would very likely lose a lot of friends and people in my social circle because I don’t live in what is a socially acceptable standard. This is one pretty general example, but it goes to show how almost everything we do, if we examine carefully enough, we do because of our social brain and because our social connections are extremely important to us – even more than we