Physiological Foundations of Behavior

The question of the basis of the gregarious character of man has been much discussed. According to some authorities it originates in the family, according to others it results somehow from the essential likeness of human individuals. Some assume a gregarious impulse as given, 7. e., as of biological origin, others maintain that the human being was originally non-social and that association has arisen secondarily through natural selection, through fear of the nonhuman environment, etc. It seems scarely necessary, however, to base all human association on a single primary factor. Why may not the factor determining association differ under different conditions? As a matter of fact, we see association taking place on the basis of fear, of pleasure, of curiosity, and apparently of simple imitation, and in such associations instinctive factors may be far more important than intelligence and purpose. On the other hand, association may occur on an intelligent self-conscious basis, with a definite purpose in view.

Historically it appears probable that two factors have been largely concerned in development of association among human _ beings and their predecessors in evolution. In the first place, the developing consciousness must become increasingly subject to the feeling of fear, unrest, discomfort, or helplessness, as it becomes increasingly aware of the world about it and its mysterious and often injurious action. Association, whether instinctive, or conscious and purposive, lessens these feelings, perhaps in part by directing attention elsewhere, and the individual is more comfortable. Biologically it is undoubtedly possible for association to develop on a pure trial and error basis and it is not improbable that even among human beings a trial and error factor, 7. e., in the broad sense a pleasure-pain factor, plays a considerable role in the more primitive and rudimentary sorts of association.

A second factor in association, not only of human beings, but of many animals, is the family or its biological basis, the sex relation. Attention has already been called to the fact that the family in some form exists temporarily, periodically or permanently among many organisms and in the social insects constitutes the basis of a complex social integration; moreover, sex relation is of course a general biological phenomenon. This relation affords a biological basis for association of individuals and it is evident that, because of its universal occurrence it may serve as the starting point and play an im-

portant réle in associations which really depend on other factors. ‘ For example, the association of male and female and later of their offspring with them, undoubtedly lessens the fear or discomfort arising in isolation and so may become the basis of the clan, of the bloodbond and of various other associations. But it serves as a basis simply because it represents a primitive biological relation between individuals, not because it is fundamentally social in any strict sense. In other words, we see various other associations developing his-

torically out of the family, not because it is a fundamental or necessary factor in such associations, but simply because it antedates them. The boy’s “gang” originates in a primitive and rudimentary sort of association just as truly as does the clan and many other social groups of primitive races, but the gang is quite independent of the family, while the primitive clan usually has some relation to it. In short, it seems possible that the conception of the family as the basis of social integration involves a confusion of historical sequence in development of human society, with cause and effect. From the biological viewpoint, association of individual organisms, whether human or non-human, appears to originate in many different ways, according to conditions, and the relation of the family to social association in any strict sense appears to be secondary and incidental rather than fundamental. The family may antedate historically various forms of association, but it is by no means necessary to their genesis. Correlation between individuals. — In the integration which constitutes the biological organism physiological correlation between the unit parts, cells or cell groups integrated is a fundamental factor. The “organism as a whole” consists of all the parts plus all the physiological relations between them and the wholeness of the organism consists in the relations between the parts rather than in the parts themselves (Chaps. III, V). The distinction between material and dynamic correlative factors drawn in Chapter V has made it possible to advance another step in the analysis of the wholeness of the organism. Consideration of the biological data in the light of this distinction has forced us to the conclusion that certain dynamic factors, viz., excitation and its transmission in living protoplasm, constitute the fundamental factors in organismic integration (Chaps. V—XI).

Excitation and its transmission constitute the basis of what we call behavior in organisms and if we admit that they are the fundamental factors in organismic integration we must also admit that the individual organism is a behavior pattern or integration in a specific protoplasm (Chap. XII). The metabolic or physiological gradient, which in its simplest form is essentially an excitation-transmission gradient, is the primary factor in determining the differentiation and integration of the living units into a whole. This gradient originates in a differential relation to environment, but once present it may persist through processes of reproduction and so be inherited.

Turning to social integration, it is evident that it, like organismie integration, depends primarily on correlation between the individuals constituting the social entity or group. Moreover, social correlation is fundamentally dynamic rather than material, that is to say, it consists primarily in the transmission from one individual to another of energy changes which affect the sense organs. The transmission in this case is not of course through a physically continuous protoplasm, but through other physical media, but this social correlative factor originates in excitatory and transmissive changes in one individual or group and results finally in excitatory and transmissive changes in the other individuals affected. This is true whether the correlation consists in the instinctive or intelligent behavior of one individual or group of which others become aware through sight, hearing or other senses, or whether communication occurs directly by signs, speech, direct, or transmitted by telegraph, telephone, etc., or by writing, books, or other indirect means.

We may say then, I believe, that social integration, like organismic integration, depends primarily upon dynamic correlation of excitatory-transmissive character. The excitatory and transmissive process as a whole may be enormously more complex than in physiological integration, and may consist in part of physiological processes in protoplasm and in part of transmission of energy changes in some physical medium intervening between the living individuals. Even in its simplest forms social correlation originates in the behavior of individual organisms or groups and in its highest forms among men it originates in an effective idea, with all that the term implies of physiological or psychic complexity. Organic continuity in the biological sense does not exist, but the individual plus the means of communication constitute the morphological organ of communication. Sociologists have often pointed out that the tool, the instrument, in fact, any fabrication, becomes in a sense an organ when used by man in the control of the environment. We may even go a step farther than this and say that speech makes the atmosphere, sight, the ether, an organ of social correlation, as truly as protoplasm is an organ of physiological transmission. But whether or not we admit such analogies,

the important point is that the media of the natural environment, or man-made tools and instruments do provide a basis for dynamic continuity between individuals. This continuity is even more effective as a substratum for social correlation than the protoplasmic substratum of the individual for physiological correlation. It is evident that even the simplest forms of social material correlation, 7. e., of barter and exchange, or commerce, are impossible without such dynamic correlation. We cannot conceive of social integration as originating in material exchange between individuals or groups without such transmissive correlation, direct or indirect. Material exchange, commerce, is unquestionably a factor of great importance in social differentation and integration, but that it is the primary factor, I think no one believes. Since the theory of formative substances was advanced by Sachs many biologists have maintained that physiological integration originates in such material transport alone, but this conception ignores completely the fact that irritability and capacity for transmitting excitation are fundamental properties of protoplasm, and that material exchange can become an ordering and integrating factor only when different regions, cells or parts have already become different. Similarly, material exchange is significant, as a social and integrating factor only secondarily, 7. e., when some sort and degree of differentiation and integration already exist.

From this viewpoint physiological and social integration both represent the integration of living systems into larger wholes through the agency of dynamic correlation. At the one extreme, the simple organism, the initiating factor is the relatively simple protoplasmic excitation resulting from relation to environment which is transmitted through protoplasm, at the other, intelligent integration among human beings, it is an idea and unless we assume psychic autonomy in the individual, this idea must have originated in some individual or individuals at some time through excitatory changes in relation to environment. ‘To serve as a pasis of social correlation such an idea must not only be communicated, but must be effective in determining the behavior of individuals with respect to others. Whatever the idea may be psychologically, it is certainly represented physiologically by excitatory and transmissive processes and the simple protoplasmic excitation which determines a temporary or permanent transmission gradient constitutes the first physiological step toward the idea.

Leadership, dominance and subordination. — The consideration of physiological integration in the individual organism has led us to a conception of physiological dominance and subordination as a fundamental factor in such integration (Chaps. IV, X). It has also been pointed out that this physiological relation of dominance and subordination arises as an essential feature of excitation and its transmission. In the simplest case the region of primary excitation dominates other regions to which the excitation is transmitted, because through the transmitted excitation it determines their physiological condition at least for the moment. When a physiological gradient has been established the region of highest metabolic rate, 7. e., the region which is living most rapidly or intensely, is the dominant region. Because of its physiological condition it reacts more rapidly or more intensely to external factors than other parts and so influences the condition of other parts to a much greater degree than they influence it. Else- | where I have endeavored to show that this relation of dominance and subordination is a fundamental factor in development and that neryous dominance and control in general and more specifically the dominance of the cephalic nervous system in the higher animals, is a physiological consequence of the relation of dominance and subordination in the simple physiological gradient (Child, ’21 a).

Moreover, the dominant region is not merely a pacemaker in development and function, but is a factor in determining the differentiation of subordinate parts (Chaps. VIII-X). The cells of the organism differentiate along different lines, not because of inherent specific differences, but because of the differences in their relations to other cells and to the external world. Speaking in general terms we may say that the relation of dominance and subordination creates the axiate organism. Through this relation the course of development of individual cells or cell groups is determined and controlled. Different cells become different from each other and from that which they would have been in the absence of this relation.

In fact, an analysis of physiological integration leads us to a conception of physiological leadership, based primarily on dynamic factors. Physiologists have recognized clearly the existence of such dominance or leadership in the “pacemaker” of the heart and various other rhythmic organs (pp. 149-151) and the dominance of the growing tip and of other regions of relatively high activity in plants has long been known to the botanists (pp. 62, 139). The development of zodlogy along predominantly morphological lines has led to structural rather than dynamic conceptions of the animal organism, and the zodlogist has not always found it easy to attain any idea of “the organism as a whole,” It is evident, however, that the orderly behavior of the

organism in development and Miaction wtise be determined either by an effective physiological dominance or leadership of some sort, or by some metaphysical principle such as Driesch’s entelechy, and the evidence points us to the first alternative. Sociology, like zodlogy, has not always been clear as regards the part played by leadership in social integration. Not infrequently a “social impulse,” the “social mind” or the “ethnic mind,” or some other basis of integration has been conceived as if it existed somehow apart from, and superior to, the individual. On the other hand, the fundamental importance of leadership for any except the most rudimentary social integration has been pointed out again and again. It seems evident that social integration cannot develop very far without some sort of leadership, whether personal or impersonal, autocratic or representative. But leadership is dominance of some sort, either of the person, the group or the idea, and involves subordination, voluntary or involuntary, of those who are led.

Rudimentary and temporary integrations among human beings may occur with very little evidence of leadership. For example, the crowd, the horde, etc., may be without definite leadership, but if we watch its formation we observe temporary, evanescent and shifting, leadership. The crowd began with a single individual or a small group and this individual or group represents for the time being the leader, Others observing, join the group and thus in their turn serve as leaders for still others and so the process goes on. But until some definite and more or less persistent leadership arises in it, such a crowd is a mere aggregation of individuals. It is, in fact, much like a cell aggregation without a definite axiate pattern, or like an unstimulated Ameba. The appearance of leadership may determine a more or less definite new pattern, as in the case of Ameba pp. 57-59).

The simplest sort of organismic pattern is the surface-interior pattern (pp. 38, 57, 93), which represents merely the differences between parts directly exposed to environment and those not so exposed. Here the only dominance or leadership is that of the surface, as contrasted with the interior. Certain simple social integrations resemble very closely this surface-interior pattern and even show a morphological differentiation in relation to it. For example, the wagon trains crossing the western plains in earlier days often made camp, when in hostile Indian country, by disposing the wagons in a circle with women and children inside this circle and the men, or part of them, patrolling the periphery. Where the methods of travel and transport are still primitive and subject to attack by bandits or hostile tribes

some such kind of camp is still very generally found, and in some parts ~ of the world the primitive village shows a somewhat similar surfaceinterior pattern. In such pattern the periphery, because of its more direct relation to environment, dominates the interior in certain respects, but no other leadership is apparent in the pattern. Undoubtedly the origin of the idea of this sort of camp involved leadership, and the arrangement of the camp in a particular case may be determined by a leader, or where environmental conditions have made such a pattern necessary in the past, the idea in impersonal form, 7. €., as custom, tradition, dominates. The pattern itself, however, is directly related to environment, and since there is no environmental differential in different radii which determines differences of reaction there is nothing more than surface-interior pattern. Moreover, there may be no fixed differentiation of individuals in such pattern. If the camp is composed entirely of men, each of them will probably take his turn in patrolling the periphery. As in the surface-interior organism, the differentation in such cases is directly determined by relation to environment.

if such a camp is attacked at one point of its periphery, it may become for the time being and in some degree axiate, with the region of greatest activity and dominance at the point of attack. Attack at another point of the camp determines reaction there and with the repulse of the attacks and recovery from the excitement reversion to the surface-interior pattern may occur. Such change resembles in some respects the formation of a pseudopod in Ameba, but the pseudopod usually represents a reaction of avoidance or escape rather than of resistance and so is more or less definitely localized on other portions of the surface than that directly subjected to disturbance.

Such social integration is of course very simple and rudimentary and, as noted above, is directly related to environment. Whenever human beings or the higher animals aggregate into a group, such surface-interior pattern must necessarily develop to some extent because of the different relations to environment of the superficial and other portions of the aggregation. Both biologically and socially it is the simplest form of integrative pattern possible among the living units concerned.

It is evident, however, that social integration cannot proceed very far without definite and relatively permanent leadership, embodied in a person, a group, or a body of tradition, custom, law, ete. Asa matter of fact, we find the relation of dominance and subordination an essential factor in the progress of social, as of biological organization. In certain primitive forms of social pattern dominance may ‘be exercised by an individual with a club, in others by the patriarch,

the “old man” of H. G. Wells, in still others by the medicine man, the supposed possessor of magical or occult powers and so on. In all these cases, however, the dominance is essentially psychic and involves first the idea of fear, reverence, superstition, and second the effect of this idea in determining behavior. The excitation of protoplasm and its transmission is effective as an integrating factor, only as it alters the pirotoplasm and determines its behavior, and similarly the idea is effective socially, only as it determines behavior. With the prog-

_ress of social integration the personal factor in dominance becomes more and more completely replaced by the impersonal factor, the idea, in the form of tradition, law, custom, etc. In earlier times the dominance of the monarch was to a considerable extent personal, but with the progress of time the monarch came to be more and more an institution, 7. e., the embodiment of an idea far greater than himself, to which he personally was subordinate. In all the more highly developed institutions of modern society, such as the nation, the church, the dominance of an idea as the effective agent in determining behavior is clearly evident.

Recognition of this dominance of ideas in social integration has been perhaps the chief factor in leading the sociologist to regard biological analogies as at best remote and of little practical value. Moreover, the conceptions advanced by certain schools of sociology of the group-mind, the social mind, the ethnic mind as the source of the dominant idea seem to separate sociology and biology still further. But when we examine the basis and processes of integration, rather than merely their morphological or functional results, the physiological integration of the organism and the psychic integration of human society seem to show certain fundamental similarities or identities.

The origin of the dominant idea. — Tracing briefly the origin of the dominant idea, it may be pointed out, first, that the group mind or social mind consists of the minds of the individuals composing the group plus all the relations between these minds. In the final analysis the first approach toward the dominant idea, whether instinctive or intelligent, must have originated in the mind of some individual, or possibly in the minds of several or many individuals at about the same time. Moreover, it must have originated either in the reaction of some individual or individuals to environmental factors different from those affecting other individuals, or in differences in indi-

viduals, such that under the same environment the idea or its foundation arose in the minds of one or more of them, but not in the minds of others. In the one case the leadership or dominance results directly from the environmental differential. The man who has had experience along certain lines has usually developed ideas which the man without such experience is not likely to have. In the other case leadership depends on the intrinsic differences between individuals. The personal leader is a more or less “exceptional” individual, and a dominant idea may originate in a mind which reacts to a given environment in a way different from that of most minds. In this latter case the basis of the social integration is already present in the intrinsic differences between individuals, and all that is needed is a particular environment, in other words, “the right time” or “the psychological moment” to make the integration real and effective.

The intrinsic differences between individuals must of course have been determined in some way, either through differences in the past history of the individuals or by heredity. But we do not believe that the hereditary differences between individuals arose “ spontaneously,”’ without cause. They must have been determined originally by relations between a germ plasm and its environment, but we have at present no conclusive evidence that these relations are of the sort postulated by the Lamarckian theory. The important point is that the innate differences between individuals, which make of one a leader or the originator of a dominant idea, and of another a follower, must have originated at some time in the past in the relations between protoplasms and their environments. That is to say, in spite of its psychic character, dominance in social integration, whether personal or impersonal, is not independent of the external world in its origin. According to the biological viewpoint, each human being is what he is because of present and past relations to environment of his protoplasm and the protoplasms from which it has arisen. In short, dominance in social, as in physiological integration, must originate in reaction to an environmental differential.

The dominant idea does not remain unchanged, but undergoes more or less rapid change and development. It usually becomes more distinct and definite in certain respects, but may be greatly modified in the course of time by the additions and other alterations which it undergoes in the minds of the individuals composing the group. Through the action of so-called social heredity the dominant idea may become or include a great body of tradition, law, custom. In

_ the case of a great modern nation, for example, the idea of the nation which, through its effect on the behavior of the individuals composing it, is the dominant factor in the integration, is now exceedingly complex and its content is very different from that of the dominant idea of tribe, clan, gang, ete., from which it has developed. It is commonly less effective in controlling, as a formal custom or tradition, the minuter details of individual behavior, as it does in many primitive societies, but at the same time it may be more effective as a dominant: idea influencing intelligent behavior. The greater complexity of its content makes its influence on the behavior of human beings more varied and more far-reaching, consequently it is able to dominate and integrate much larger groups with much greater diversity of interests than is the primitive idea. The development of physiological dominance in the nervous system may be described in almost the same terms. —~

Since this relation is a factor in determining the behavior of the human individual, it is a factor in making him what he is. His individuality is more definite, more highly developed and differentiated because of his social relations. As in the organism, the changes in him go hand in hand with the development of integration. These changes may consist of repression or inhibition of certain potentialities and realization and increased development of others, but in any case it is sufficiently obvious that the human individual is not simply the product of heredity. His social relations, or more specifically, his subordination in some way and in some degree to more or less definite ideas play a fundamental part in determining the course of his thought, his sentiments and his behavior.

To sum up: it appears that leadership, dominance, the pacemaker, play essentially the same rdle in social as in physiological integration. Moreover, if the conclusions advanced are correct, there is physiological continuity, not simply from the physiological gradient to the fully developed organism, but to the dominance of the idea in intelligent social integration. The great modern nation-states represent social integration on the largest scale and in the greatest complexity thus far attained. In the state, government, 7. ¢., a relation of dominance and subordination of some sort and some degree is a fundamental factor. Even in the most primitive associations dominance and subordination are present, but as transitory and shifting, rather than definite and persistent relations. The crowd may be swayed now by one leader or idea, now by another. A party lost in the woods may follow one leader for a time and then turn to another, 7. e. , dominance may be a matter of trial. In the surface-interior integration, the circular camp mentioned above, the dominance of the individuals at the surface may be replaced in case of attack by the dominance of a single region of the periphery. But in any persistent orderly integration, such as the state, government, 7.e.,a definite and persistent relation of dominance and subordination, exists and on it the orderly character of the state pattern depends. In fact, the state possesses social polarity and may be termed an axiate social pattern, with government representing the dominant region and the various classes and differentiations of its members in relation to the government the subordinate regions of various levels of the axis.