
A neural link between affective understanding and interpersonal attraction [pdf] - lainon
http://www.pnas.org/content/113/16/E2248.full.pdf
======
lainon
Conclusion.

In sum, we have shown that subjective understanding during social interaction
can modulate interpersonal attraction. Interestingly, the findings of the
current study suggest that the neural mechanisms underlying individual
adjustments of interpersonal attraction during social encounters might act
through internal reward signals that are partly independent of external
feedback, which makes them perhaps less prone to cheating by potential
cooperation partners. To investigate the interaction between intrinsic
confidence signals and other — honest or manipulative — signals sent back and
forth between communication partners and to examine the neural determinants of
the dynamics of human social relations in larger groups (“social connectomes”)
remain challenging tasks for future studies. The current study suggests that
mutual understanding is an important factor in interpersonal attraction, and
that further research into the role of a common neural vocabulary in
interpersonal attraction will lead to a better understanding of the
neurobiological factors that define human social relations.

~~~
gcr
Would you mind unpacking this? This language is harder to follow than it
should be.

Here's my attempt, please revise:

1\. Our own attraction of our partners is modulated by our internal reward
machinery.

2\. This reward machinery doesn't depend on external signals very much. That
means it's hard for our partners to manipulate.

3\. Future work: Investigating how our intrinsic confidence signals are shaped
by our partner's messages

4\. More future work: Investigating these effects in larger groups

5\. Takeaway: Mutual understanding is an important factor in interpersonal
interaction

6\. Takeaway: We should research a vocabulary to describe neural states; this
will help researchers express interpersonal factors more precisely

~~~
choxi
The paragraph summarizing the experiment is clarifying:

> Significance.

> Humans interacting with other humans must be able to understand their
> interaction partner’s affect and motivations, often without words. We
> examined whether people are attracted to others whose affective behavior
> they can easily understand. For this, we asked participants to watch
> different persons experiencing different emotions. We found the better a
> participant thought they could understand another person’s emotion the more
> they felt attracted toward that person. Importantly, these individual
> changes in interpersonal attraction were predicted by activity in the
> participant’s reward circuit, which in turn signaled how well the
> participant’s “neural vocabulary” was suited to decode the other’s behavior.
> This research elucidates neurobiological processes that might play an
> important role in the formation and success of human social relations.

------
nerdponx
Makes sense. One of the most attractive things about my girlfriend initially
was that she and I related some some things that a lot of other people don't
seem to get.

~~~
woliveirajr
I didn't get that much things in common in the beginning, except that we would
understand and laugh from the same jokes. It took a while to refine many other
things, like understanding things without needing to say and so on.

You have to have things in common to be a resting place, so that you have
peace of mind while doing those things together.

You also have to have things that you're good at and that makes the other
person proud (kind of envy) of you, things that they'll contemplate while
you're doing.

And, finally, things that you suck at but they are good, so that you'll also
stare while they are doing and will keep you enchanted.

------
macey
Great read. Makes me reflect on my own taste, though. I seem to be attracted
to people I can't quite understand, people who take some work for me to figure
out. Maybe there's a solid relational foundation between us, but we're always
quite different people and I'm kept guessing a lot of the time. I find it
interesting, fun, stimulating. I'm sure there are plenty like me in that
respect. Any armchair hypotheses for that?

~~~
abledon
I'll make one in a slightly comical sense:

You are most likely a lover of problems and puzzles. Relationships where you
don't understand the other person, is the Ultimate Problem Puzzle, but in the
emotional field zone, where you can experience and interact with the problem
in so much more ways than just computer code.

The same dopamine high of breaking through in solving a problem in the messy
legacy code base, refactoring down those 1000s of lines into 100s, increasing
the webserver's performance etc.. those same circuits are firing when trying
to 'fix' or 'solve' the indecipherable person you are dating.

however, sometimes after a beginner hacker starts, maybe 3,4,5 years, and
after their philosophizing-abstractionist hacker phase, they become the 'wise
hacker', where writing ---no code at all--- is the best code to try and solve,
or bypass problems. Maybe this is what people feel when they meet a S.O. who
share mutual intrinsic emotional understanding.

I don't personally subscribe to this philosophy but I could see some other
pattern-based thinkers branching off it.

------
AlexCoventry
How is stuff like this still news, given the "epistemological crisis" in
psychology research? Did they pre-register their analysis or arrange some kind
of independent replication?

------
novia
A lot of my ex-partners complained that we "didn't have anything in common,"
to the extent that I started telling new love interests, "Look, I already know
we don't have anything in common. Don't bring it up later as a reason to
leave."

After reading this I wonder if it was actually that my ex-partners were
incapable of understanding how someone unlike them would react to different
situations. I was usually able to predict their reactions, but maybe it was
only a one way street.

~~~
onion2k
_I was usually able to predict their reactions, but maybe it was only a one
way street._

You trying to predict what your partner is going to do might not have been
such a positive contribution to the relationship. People don't like it when
someone tries to predict their reaction to something. If you're right then it
makes the other person look predictable, and if you're wrong then you look
like you don't know them very well. Either way it's bad.

~~~
naasking
> People don't like it when someone tries to predict their reaction to
> something.

What? How exactly do you expect to pleasantly surprise your significant other
if you can't predict what they'll like? How could you possibly buy them gifts?
I'm pretty sure that predicting what I like is something that pretty much
everyone is perfectly ok with.

~~~
onion2k
You'd think so, but research suggests that isn't the case. There was an
interesting psychological study recently that showed the best gift (in terms
of how happy the receiver is) reflects the personality of the giver rather
than the recipient[1]. You might not mind, but other people do. And obviously
it depends hugely on the situation, people involved, relationship, etc.

[1] [https://digest.bps.org.uk/2015/07/31/what-weve-been-
getting-...](https://digest.bps.org.uk/2015/07/31/what-weve-been-getting-
wrong-about-choosing-gifts/)

~~~
naasking
> There was an interesting psychological study recently that showed the best
> gift (in terms of how happy the receiver is) reflects the personality of the
> giver rather than the recipient

That's great, but you claimed that your partner _wouldn 't like it_ if you try
to predict what they would like. The link you provided actually says the
opposite: that people _say_ they prefer gifts tailored to their preferences,
which means they _wouldn 't_ mind you predicting what they'd like, contrary to
your original claim.

------
swehner
I don't know if the authors are trying to avoid it, but what they are
describing hints at a similar conclusion for the opposites of attraction: hate
+ racism

~~~
pinkrooftop
not really. It's saying if you can't understand the emotional state then you
dont get the reward so its more neutral than hate

------
fiatjaf
What about intellectual understanding?

~~~
riazrizvi
They said emotions, motivations and intentions. So probably intellectual ideas
that are not impersonal?

------
ruuki
Welcome to Hacker News Dear Abby thread!

~~~
pjc50
Another step in the transition to HN becoming Reddit :(

------
estefan
What's the TLDR?

~~~
riazrizvi
The more certain you are of how someone feels, the more you are attracted to
them. Not only how they feel, but also how they are motivated. They conclude
this from looking at patterns of neural activity.

~~~
eli_gottlieb
But most importantly, the "attraction" is an intrinsic reward signal generated
by your own brain from judging that it understands another person well. The
other person can't actually alter that intrinsic reward except by making their
actions easier to understand.

~~~
papapra
It explains why being anxious or having low self-esteem is unattractive.

~~~
duderific
Well, it sorta depends on how the anxiety or low self esteem manifests itself.
If the person is aware of their anxiety and doesn't try to cover it with over-
compensation in the other direction (excessive self assurance or arrogance),
then it can be rather charming.

~~~
papapra
Maybe just for the woman

