Humans have evolved various social behaviors such as interpersonal motor synchrony (i.e., matching movements in time), play and sport or religious ritual that bolster group cohesion and facilitate cooperation. While important for small communities, the face-to-face nature of such technologies makes them infeasible in large-scale societies where risky cooperation between anonymous individuals must be enforced through moral judgment and, ultimately, altruistic punishment. However, the unbiased applicability of group norms is often jeopardized by moral hypocrisy, i.e., the application of moral norms in favor of closer subgroup members such as key socioeconomic partners and kin. We investigated whether social behaviors that facilitate close ties between people also promote moral hypocrisy that may hamper large-scale group functioning. We recruited 129 student subjects that either interacted with a confederate in the high synchrony or low synchrony conditions or performed movements alone. Subsequently, participants judged a moral transgression committed by the confederate toward another anonymous student. The results showed that highly synchronized participants judged the confederate's transgression less harshly than the participants in the other two conditions and that this effect was mediated by the perception of group unity with the confederate. We argue that for synchrony to amplify group identity in large-scale societies, it needs to be properly integrated with morally compelling group symbols that accentuate the group's overarching identity (such as in religious worship or military parade). Without such contextualization, synchrony may create bonded subgroups that amplify local preferences rather than impartial and wide application of moral norms.

LEVYNA Laboratory for the Experimental Research of Religion Department for the Study of Religions Masaryk University Brno Czechia

Zobrazit více v PubMed

Alcorta C. S., Sosis R. (2005). Ritual, emotion, and sacred symbols: the evolution of religion as an adaptive complex. Hum. Nat. 16 323–359. 10.1007/s12110-005-1014-3 PubMed DOI

Alexander R. D. (1987). The Biology of Moral Systems. New Brunswick: Aldine Transaction.

Baguley T. (2009). Standardized or simple effect size: what should be reported? Br. J. Psychol. 100 603–617. 10.1348/000712608X377117 PubMed DOI

Bastian B., Jetten J., Ferris L. J. (2014). Pain as social glue: shared pain increases cooperation. Psychol. Sci. 25 2079–2085. 10.1177/0956797614545886 PubMed DOI

Batson C. D., Thompson E. R. (2001). Why don’t moral people act morally? Motivational considerations. Curr. Direct. Psychol. Sci. 10 54–57. 10.1111/1467-8721.00114 DOI

Batson C. D., Thompson E. R., Seuferling G., Whitney H., Strongman J. A. (1999). Moral hypocrisy: appearing moral to oneself without being so. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 77 525–537. 10.1037/0022-3514.77.3.525 PubMed DOI

Bauer M., Blattman C., Chytilová J., Henrich J., Miguel E., Mitts T. (2016). Can war foster cooperation? J. Econ. Perspect. 30 249–274. 10.1257/jep.30.3.249 DOI

Bauer M., Cassar A., Chytilová J., Henrich J. (2014). War’s enduring effects on the development of egalitarian motivations and in-group biases. Psychol. Sci. 25 47–57. 10.1177/0956797613493444 PubMed DOI

Bernhard H., Fischbacher U., Fehr E. (2006). Parochial altruism in humans. Nature 442 912–915. 10.1038/nature04981 PubMed DOI

Bowles S. (2006). Group competition, reproductive leveling, and the evolution of human altruism. Science 314 1569–1572. 10.1126/science.1134829 PubMed DOI

Boyd R., Gintis H., Bowles S., Richerson P. J. J. (2003). The evolution of altruistic punishment. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 100 3531–3535. 10.1073/pnas.0630443100 PubMed DOI PMC

Charles S. J., Farias M., van Mulukom V., Saraswati A., Dein S., Watts F. (2020). Blocking mu-opioid receptors inhibits social bonding in rituals. Biol. Lett. 16:20200485. 10.1098/rsbl.2020.0485 PubMed DOI PMC

Choi J. J., Bowles S. (2007). The coevolution of parochial altruism and war. Science 318 636–640. 10.1126/science.1144237 PubMed DOI

Christensen R. H. B. (2019). Ordinal–Regression Models for Ordinal Data. R package version 2019. 12–10. Available online at: https://CRAN.R-project.org/package=ordinal

Cirelli L. K., Wan S. J., Spinelli C., Trainor L. J. (2017). Effects of interpersonal movement synchrony on Infant helping behaviors: is music necessary? Music Percept. Interdiscipl. J. 34 319–326. 10.1525/mp.2017.34.3.319 PubMed DOI

Cohen E. E. A., Ejsmond-Frey R., Knight N., Dunbar R. I. M. (2010). Rowers’ high: behavioural synchrony is correlated with elevated pain thresholds. Biol. Lett. 6 106–108. 10.1098/rsbl.2009.0670 PubMed DOI PMC

Cornelis I., Van Hiel A., De Cremer D. (2011). Birds of a feather: leader-follower similarity and procedural fairness effects on cooperation. Eur. J. Work Organ. Psychol. 20 388–415. 10.1080/13594321003630055 DOI

De Dreu C. K. W., Greer L. L., Van Kleef G. A., Shalvi S., Handgraaf M. J. J. (2011). Oxytocin promotes human ethnocentrism. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 108 1262–1266. 10.1073/pnas.1015316108 PubMed DOI PMC

Dunbar R. I. M., Baron R., Frangou A., Pearce E., van Leeuwen E. J. C., Stow J., et al. (2012). Social laughter is correlated with an elevated pain threshold. Proc. R. Soc. B 279 1161–1167. 10.1098/rspb.2011.1373 PubMed DOI PMC

Effron D. A., Knowles E. D. (2015). Entitativity and intergroup bias: how belonging to a cohesive group allows people to express their prejudices. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 108 234–253. 10.1037/pspa0000020 PubMed DOI

Fehr E., Fischbacher U. (2003). The nature of human altruism. Nature 425 785–791. 10.1038/nature02043 PubMed DOI

Fessler D. M. T., Barrett H. C., Kanovsky M., Stich S., Holbrook C., Henrich J., et al. (2015). Moral parochialism and contextual contingency across seven societies. Proc. R. Soc. B 282:20150907. 10.1098/rspb.2015.0907 PubMed DOI PMC

Fischer R., Callander R., Reddish P., Bulbulia J. (2013). How do rituals affect cooperation? An experimental field study comparing nine ritual types. Hum. Nat. 24 115–125. 10.1007/s12110-013-9167-y PubMed DOI

Fischer R., Kruekaew J. (2019). Synchrony vs. pain in males and females: an examination of differential effects on social bonding in a naturally occurring ritual. Relig. Brain Behav. 10 407–427. 10.1080/2153599X.2019.1626271 DOI

Fischer R., Xygalatas D. (2014). Extreme rituals as social technologies. J. Cogn. Cult. 14 345–355. 10.1163/15685373-12342130 DOI

Francois P., Fujiwara T., van Ypersele T. (2018). The origins of human pro-sociality: a test of cultural group selection on economic data and in the laboratory. Sci. Adv. 4:eaat2201. 10.1126/sciadv.aat2201 PubMed DOI PMC

Gaechter S., Schulz J. (2016). Intrinsic honesty and the prevalence of rule violations across societies. Nature 531 496–499. 10.1038/nature17160 PubMed DOI PMC

Gaertner L., Schopler J. (1998). Perceived ingroup entitativity and intergroup bias: an interconnection of self and others. Eur. J. Soc. Psychol. 28 963–980. 10.1002/(SICI)1099-0992(1998110)28:6<963::AID-EJSP905>3.0.CO;2-S DOI

Galbally M., Lewis A. J., Ijzendoorn M., Van Permezel M. (2011). The role of oxytocin in mother-infant relations: a systematic review of human studies. Harv. Rev. Psychiatry 19 1–14. 10.3109/10673229.2011.549771 PubMed DOI

Gebauer L., Witek M. A. G., Hansen N. C., Thomas J., Konvalinka I., Vuust P. (2016). Oxytocin improves synchronisation in leader-follower interaction. Sci. Rep. 6:38416. 10.1038/srep38416 PubMed DOI PMC

Gneezy A., Fessler D. M. T. (2012). Conflict, sticks and carrots: war increases prosocial punishments and rewards. Proc. R. Soc. B Biol. Sci. 279 219–223. 10.1098/rspb.2011.0805 PubMed DOI PMC

Grape C., Sandoren M., Hansson L. O., Ericson M., Theorell T. (2003). Does singing promote well-being? An empirical study of professional and amateur singers during a singing lesson. Integr. Physiol. Behav. Sci. 38 65–74. 10.1007/bf02734261 PubMed DOI

Greene J. (2013). Moral Tribes. Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them. New York, NY: The Penguin press.

Haidt J. (2013). The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion. New York, NY: Vintage Books.

Henrich J., Bauer M., Cassar A., Chytilová J., Purzycki B. (2019). War increases religiosity. Nat. Hum. Behav. 3 129–135. 10.1038/s41562-018-0512-3 PubMed DOI

Henrich J., McElreath R., Barr A., Ensminger J., Barrett C., Bolyanatz A., et al. (2006). Costly punishment across human societies. Science 312 1767–1770. 10.1126/science.1127333 PubMed DOI

Hill K. R., Wood B. M., Baggio J., Hurtado A. M., Boyd R. (2014). Hunter-gatherer inter-band interaction rates: implications for cumulative culture. PLoS One 9:e102806. 10.1371/journal.pone.0102806 PubMed DOI PMC

Hobson N. M., Schroeder J., Risen J. L., Xygalatas D., Inzlicht M. (2018). The psychology of rituals: an integrative review and process-based framework. Pers. Soc. Psychol. Rev. 22 260–284. 10.1177/1088868317734944 PubMed DOI

Hove M. J., Risen J. L. (2009). it’s all in the timing: interpersonal synchrony increases affiliation. Soc. Cogn. 27 949–961. 10.1521/soco.2009.27.6.949 DOI

Hymes R. W., Leinart M., Rowe S., Rogers W. (1993). Acquaintance rape: The effect of race of defendant and race of victim on white juror decisions. J. Soc. Psychol. 133 627–634. 10.1080/00224545.1993.9713917 PubMed DOI

Kirschner S., Tomasello M. (2010). Joint music making promotes prosocial behavior in 4-year-old children. Evol. Hum. Behav. 31 354–364. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2010.04.004 DOI

Konvalinka I., Xygalatas D., Bulbulia J., Schjødt U., Jegindø E.-M., Wallot S., et al. (2011). Synchronized arousal between performers and related spectators in a fire-walking ritual. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 108 8514–8519. 10.1073/pnas.1016955108 PubMed DOI PMC

Krupp D. B., Debruine L. M., Barclay P. (2008). A cue of kinship promotes cooperation for the public good. Evol. Hum. Behav. 29 49–55. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2007.08.002 DOI

Lakens D. (2010). Movement synchrony and perceived entitativity. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 46 701–708. 10.1016/j.jesp.2010.03.015 DOI

Lammers J., Stapel D. A., Galinsky A. D. (2010). Power increases hypocrisy: moralizing in reasoning, immorality in behavior. Psychol. Sci. 21 737–744. 10.1177/0956797610368810 PubMed DOI

Lang M. (2019). The evolutionary paths to collective rituals: an interdisciplinary perspective on the origins and functions of the basic social act. Arch. Psychol. Relig. 41 224–252. 10.1177/0084672419894682 DOI

Lang M., Bahna V., Shaver J. H., Reddish P., Xygalatas D. (2017). Sync to link: endorphin-mediated synchrony effects on cooperation. Biol. Psychol. 127 191–197. 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2017.06.001 PubMed DOI

Lang M., Purzycki B. G., Apicella C. L., Atkinson Q. D., Bolyanatz A., Cohen E., et al. (2019). Moralizing gods, impartiality, and religious parochialism across 15 societies. Proc. R. Soc. B 286 1–10. 10.1098/rspb.2019.0202 PubMed DOI PMC

Lang M., Shaw D. J., Reddish P., Wallot S., Mitkidis P., Xygalatas D. (2015). Lost in the rhythm: effects of rhythm on subsequent interpersonal coordination. Cogn. Sci. 40 1797–1815. 10.1111/cogs.12302 PubMed DOI

Launay J., Tarr B., Dunbar R. I. M. (2016). Synchrony as an adaptive mechanism for large-scale human social bonding. Ethology 122 779–789. 10.1111/eth.12528 DOI

Marques J. M., Yzerbyt V. Y., Leyens J.-P. (1988). The “Black Sheep Effect”: extremity of judgments towards ingroup members as a function of group identification. Eur. J. Soc. Psychol. 18 1–16. 10.1002/ejsp.2420180102 DOI

McNeill W. (1995). Keeping Together in Time: Dance and Drill in Human History. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Miles L. K., Lumsden J., Richardson M. J., Neil Macrae C. (2011). Do birds of a feather move together? Group membership and behavioral synchrony. Exp. Brain Res. 211 495–503. 10.1007/s00221-011-2641-z PubMed DOI

Miles L. K., Nind L. K., Macrae C. N. (2009). The rhythm of rapport: interpersonal synchrony and social perception. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 46 585–589. 10.1016/j.jesp.2009.02.002 DOI

Mogan R., Fischer R., Bulbulia J. A. (2017). To be in synchrony or not? A meta-analysis of synchrony’s effects on behavior, perception, cognition and affect. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 72 13–20. 10.1016/j.jesp.2017.03.009 DOI

Newson M., Bortolini T., Buhrmester M., da Silva S. R., da Aquino J. N. Q., Whitehouse H. (2018). Brazil’s football warriors: social bonding and inter-group violence. Evol. Hum. Behav. 39 675–683. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2018.06.010 DOI

Nowak M. A., Sigmund K. (2005). Evolution of indirect reciprocity. Nature 437 1291–1298. 10.1038/nature04131 PubMed DOI

Paladino M.-P., Mazzurega M., Pavani F., Schubert T. W. (2010). Synchronous multisensory stimulation blurs self-other boundaries. Psychol. Sci. 21 1202–1207. 10.1177/0956797610379234 PubMed DOI

Polman E., Ruttan R. L. (2012). Effects of anger, guilt, and envy on moral hypocrisy. Pers. Soc. Psychol. Bull. 38 129–139. 10.1177/0146167211422365 PubMed DOI

Purzycki B. G., Apicella C., Atkinson Q. D., Cohen E., Mcnamara R. A., Willard A. K., et al. (2016). Moralistic gods, supernatural punishment and the expansion of human sociality. Nature 530 327–330. 10.1038/nature16980 PubMed DOI

R Core Team (2019). R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing. Vienna: R Foundation for Statistical Computing.

Rabinowitch T. C., Knafo-Noam A. (2015). Synchronous rhythmic interaction enhances children’s perceived similarity and closeness towards each other. PLoS One 10:e0120878. 10.1371/journal.pone.0120878 PubMed DOI PMC

Reddish P., Bulbulia J., Fischer R. (2013a). Does synchrony promote generalized prosociality? Relig. Brain Behav. 4 1–17. 10.1080/2153599X.2013.764545 DOI

Reddish P., Fischer R., Bulbulia J. (2013b). Let’s dance together: synchrony, shared intentionality and cooperation. PLoS One 8:e71182. 10.1371/journal.pone.0071182 PubMed DOI PMC

Reddish P., Tong E. M. W., Jong J., Lanman J. A., Whitehouse H. (2016). Collective synchrony increases prosociality towards non-performers and outgroup members. Br. J. Soc. Psychol. 55 722–738. 10.1111/bjso.12165 PubMed DOI

Rennung M., Göritz A. S. (2016). Prosocial consequences of interpersonal synchrony: a meta-analysis. Zeitschrift Psychol. 224 168–189. 10.1027/2151-2604/a000252 PubMed DOI PMC

Richerson P. J., Baldini R., Bell A. V., Demps K., Frost K., Hillis V., et al. (2016). Cultural group selection plays an essential role in explaining human cooperation: a sketch of the evidence. Behav. Brain Sci. 39 1–68. 10.1017/S0140525X1400106X PubMed DOI

Rosseel Y. (2012). lavaan: an R package for structural equation modeling. J. Stat. Softw. 48 1–36. 10.18637/jss.v048.i02 DOI

Saltzstein H. D. (1994). The relation between moral judgment and behavior: a social-cognitive and decision-making analysis. Hum. Dev. 37 299–312. 10.1159/000278274 DOI

Schaub M. (2017). Threat and parochialism in intergroup relations: lab-in-the-field evidence from rural Georgia. Proc. R. Soc. B Biol. Sci. 284 20171560. 10.1098/rspb.2017.1560 PubMed DOI PMC

Schulz J. F., Bahrami-Rad D., Beauchamp J. P., Henrich J. (2019). The Church, intensive kinship, and global psychological variation. Science 366:eaau5141. 10.1126/science.aau5141 PubMed DOI

Sigmund K. (2009). Sympathy and similarity: the evolutionary dynamics of cooperation. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 106 8405–8406. 10.1073/pnas.0903947106 PubMed DOI PMC

Sivo S. A., Xitao F. A. N., Witta E. L., Willse J. T. (2006). The search for “optimal” cutoff properties: fit index criteria in structural equation modeling. J. Exp. Educ. 74 267–288. 10.3200/JEXE.74.3.267-288 DOI

Sommers S. R. (2007). Race and the decision making of juries. Legal Criminol. Psychol. 12 171–187. 10.1348/135532507X189687 DOI

Sosis R., Kress H. C., Boster J. S. (2007). Scars for war: evaluating alternative signaling explanations for cross-cultural variance in ritual costs. Evol. Hum. Behav. 28 234–247. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2007.02.007 DOI

Sullivan P., Gagnon M., Gammage K., Peters S. (2015). Is the effect of behavioral synchrony on cooperative behavior mediated by pain threshold. J. Soc. Psychol. 155 650–660. 10.1080/00224545.2015.1071766 PubMed DOI

Sullivan P. J., Rickers K., Gammage K. L. (2014). The effect of different phases of synchrony on pain threshold. Group Dyn. Theory Res. Pract. 18 122–128. 10.1037/gdn0000001 DOI

Tarr B., Launay J., Benson C., Dunbar R. I. M. (2017). Naltrexone blocks endorphins released when dancing in synchrony. Adap. Hum. Behav. Physiol. 3 241–254. 10.1007/s40750-017-0067-y DOI

Tarr B., Launay J., Cohen E., Dunbar R. I. M. (2015). Synchrony and exertion during dance independently raise pain threshold and encourage social bonding. Biol. Lett. 11 1–4. 10.1098/rsbl.2015.0767 PubMed DOI PMC

Tarr B., Launay J., Dunbar R. I. M. (2014). Music and social bonding: “Self-other” merging and neurohormonal mechanisms. Front. Psychol. 5:1096. 10.3389/fpsyg.2014.01096 PubMed DOI PMC

Tarr B., Launay J., Dunbar R. I. M. (2016). Silent disco: dancing in synchrony leads to elevated pain thresholds and social closeness. Evol. Hum. Behav. 37 343–349. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2016.02.004 PubMed DOI PMC

Trivers R. L. (1971). The evolution of reciprocal altruism. Q. Rev. Biol. 46 35–57. 10.1086/406755 DOI

Valdesolo P., DeSteno D. (2007). Moral hypocrisy: social groups and the flexibility of virtue. Psychol. Sci. 18 689–690. 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2007.01961.x PubMed DOI

Valdesolo P., DeSteno D. (2008). The duality of virtue: deconstructing the moral hypocrite. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 44 1334–1338. 10.1016/j.jesp.2008.03.010 DOI

Valdesolo P., DeSteno D. (2011). Synchrony and the social tuning of compassion. Emotion 11 262–266. 10.1037/a0021302 PubMed DOI

Weinstein D., Launay J., Pearce E., Dunbar R. I. M., Stewart L. (2016). Singing and social bonding: changes in connectivity and pain threshold as a function of group size. Evol. Hum. Behav. 37 152–158. 10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2015.10.002 PubMed DOI PMC

Whitehouse H., McQuinn B., Buhrmester M., Swann W. B. (2014). Brothers in arms: libyan revolutionaries bond like family. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 111 17783–17785. 10.1073/pnas.1416284111 PubMed DOI PMC

Wiltermuth S. S. (2012). Synchronous activity boosts compliance with requests to aggress. J. Exp. Soc. Psychol. 48 453–456. 10.1016/j.jesp.2011.10.007 DOI

Wiltermuth S. S., Heath C. (2009). Synchrony and cooperation. Psychol. Sci. 20 1–5. 10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02253.x PubMed DOI

Xygalatas D., Mitkidis P., Fischer R., Reddish P., Skewes J., Geertz A. W., et al. (2013). Extreme rituals promote prosociality. Psychol. Sci. 24 1602–1605. 10.1177/0956797612472910 PubMed DOI

Zhang H., Gross J., De Dreu C., Ma Y. (2019). Oxytocin promotes coordinated out-group attack during intergroup conflict in humans. eLife 8 1–19. 10.7554/eLife.40698 PubMed DOI PMC