Synchrony

Synchrony refers to the ability of organisms to coordinate collective behaviors or processes. In many domains, the behaviors or internal processes of organisms in a group will "synch up," leading to emergent behaviors that are often beneficial to the group. Atzil, Gao, Fradkin, and Barrett (2018) discuss synchrony in the context of child social development. They view synchrony as a strategy for social regulation of Allostasis and provide a few examples to support this view:

• During gestation, mothers control their fetus's allostasis through physiological synchrony.

• Mothers regulate their infant's temperature through skin-to-skin contact with the infant, synchronizing their temperatures.

• Breastfeeding synchronizes gut microbiota between mother and infant, regulating infants' immune function.

Simulations

The concept of synchrony can be illustrated by simulations of oscillating systems (see this demonstration:http://www.profghristmath.com/2019/09/03/coupled-oscillators/). When agents (pendulums or spinners in these simulations) are allowed to influence each other, they become more synchronous as time passes. Interestingly, as the network of agents becomes larger, they synchronize with each other much more quickly when they are all allowed to influence each other than when each agent can only influence its direct neighbors. This suggests that more interconnected networks will synchronize more rapidly, and raises interesting questions about synchronization, coordination, and the spread of norms in social networks among humans and other animals. This is reflected in the concept of self-organization.

Types of Synchrony

According to Bernieri et al. (1988), there are three types of synchrony:

1. Interaction rhythms

• Coordination of identical behavioral sequences between interaction partners over time
• Behavior sequences is the unit of analysis
• This seems like the oscillating systems (someone can confirm or deny)

2. Simultaneous behavior

• Identical imitation of a partner's behavior at the same point in time that the partner is enacting the behavior
• Individual behaviors is the unit of analysis
• Closely related to mimicry

3. Behavioral Meshing

• When two partners' behaviors form a single and meaningful whole
• Individual behaviors is the unit of analysis

Benefits of synchrony

Synchrony, in its various forms, represents the human ability to (un-)consciously coordinate behavior on a short time scale. These behaviors might have immediate benefits, such as interpersonal physiological regulation (Atzil, 2018) and increased positive affect (Galbusera, Finn, Tschacher, and Kyselo, 2019), as well as more delayed benefits in the realm of coordination and collaboration (Behrens, Snijdewint, Moulder, Prochazkova, & Sjak-Shie, 2019; Bietti & Sutton, 2015). According to Bietti and Sutton (2015), synchrony at timescale t1 lays the foundation for other coordinated process happening over longer time scales (t2 and t3) that eventually contribute to long-term (t4) processes such as cultural learning and remembering.

Drawbacks of synchrony

While synchrony may be designed to fulfill more basic and innate needs for organization and predictability (Bernhold & Giles, 2019), Galbusera et al. (2019) argue that a trade-off occurs during the process. For instance, synchrony-mediated coordination with others can actually lead to diminished success when people work in groups as opposed to combining their independent efforts (although this effect is remediated when people are able to maintain their individuality by, for instance, indicating their subjective confidence in their perceptual judgments; Bahrami, Olsen, Latham, Roepstorff, & Rees, 2010).

Galbusera and colleagues support a hypothesis in cognitive science in which the stability of the self vitally relies on the balance between attunement with others and the need for independence from them (trade-off hypothesis). Therefore, since the distinction between person (agent) and environment isn't clear-cut, it can instead be described in terms of non-linear interactive dynamics during which the agent and environment are mutually constrained by each other (Galbusera et al., 2019). Essentially, it would seem that if the agent becomes more synchronous with their environment, a trade-off occurs in which they are less able to self-regulate affect. Conversely, if the agent has higher intrapersonal synchrony, then they will have better self-regulation of affect, but diminished positive affect.

Findings from Galbusera et al. demonstrate that interpersonal synchrony has a stronger relationship with the self-regulation of affect than an agent's intrapersonal synchrony during a Body Conversation Task. This was hypothesized to be due to the processes influencing both positive affect and affect regulation being engaged concurrently during the Body Conversation Task.