Scientists at Keio University in Japan have found that neuronal populations in different people synchronize during social interaction and cooperation. The results of the author’s work are published in the journal. neurophotonic.
To fully understand how the brain produces social behavior, we need to study it during social encounters. To do this, scientists simultaneously monitor the brain activity of several people interacting with each other. The authors conducted a series of experiments with 39 pairs of participants. They performed a common task: to design and arrange a virtual room in a computer game. They were allowed to freely communicate to reach a conclusion that would satisfy both. Participants completed the same task alone.
After analyzing the brain signals of all participants, the scientists concluded that during joint activities, both partners synchronized the work of the superior and middle temporal regions and certain parts of the prefrontal cortex in the right hemisphere. Also, synchronization was strongest when one of the participants looked at the other to look at it.
“When participants collaborated to complete a task, populations of neurons in one brain fired simultaneously with similar populations of neurons in the other brain, as if the two brains were working together as a single system for creative problem solving,” the authors explained.