it may not be original, but this isn't a topic I've read much on, unless you count some texts on Nazism, Hans Asperger, and eugenics (I say those were texts about the very explicit "the group is more important than any individual" messaging.)
" Individual identity and sense of self are staked on those values and on belonging to the larger group." I'm going to chew on all of this for awhile (and read some of the links) but especially this line. I often lament feeling like I never belong to any particular group, even when I try and join them, and the last time I was complaining my husband said to me "you don't want to belong to a group. You hate being part of a group. Every time you join one you're miserable and then deliberately flout all their norms." which I think is a BIT harsh. I don't go out of my way to flout norms, I just also don't go out of my way to keep them. Anyway, I have this gut feeling that reading more about the theory you've presented here may help me to understand my conflicting reactions to the idea of Belonging, as well as to understand better why other people seem to react to group belonging in a way that often seems inexplicable to me.
Anyway, thank you for introducing me to this concept. I love when people smarter than me write about concepts I don't know about. It's a fun puzzle to see if I can eventually understand what they're talking about.
I know some people who participate in religion who aren't Believers, because they crave the community and otherwise share the values of the faith community they're in. Or who participate because the faith community they grew up in is a minority where they live, and it's a way of maintaining ties to their culture. Which is still a community based reason.
Hmm. I relate to some but not all of the points on your list, but I've always considered myself more of an introvert. I think, though, that if I want to be more precise I should say that my natural inclination is more object oriented than social oriented - I didn't even see the point in interacting with other people when I was a child. Why bother, when there were books to read and subjects to learn about? (this did not improve my school grades, though - I had to have intrinsic interest in a subject to actually learn it.)
I've grown a better appreciation of other people and now find them interesting such that I genuinely enjoy meeting new people and feel stifled if I only talk to the same people I know well. I feel like I need the novelty of meeting new people to maintain consistent social motivation. I suppose this is at odds with successful social group integration, though. You need to focus your efforts deeply on a small number of people to integrate, and not that I don't have any friends, but making that type of effort to the extent necessary for a *group* never feels worth it. Especially because then they have social norms and expectations, ugh. Which, clearly I can follow some social norms, or I would be in jail or dead. I understand that norms can serve a purpose and I don't think society should have zero norms, but so often they seem like arbitrary methods of delineating who is In or Out of the group. Or, in the case of values/ideology, people reflexively agree with their group/disagree with their opponent group. I understand this is a very useful mental shorthand, because who has time to research literally every possible position on every topic? but it can be frustrating when trying to have a conversation on any topic where I don't already agree with the group consensus.
But also factoring into my social tolerance is the fact that I have an easier time engaging with people in a text based format. In face to face interactions my brain is not very quick at processing social information and also is garbage at filtering out unnecessary information. So I have noticeable lag in reaction time because I can't keep up with speech AND facial expressions AND body language and I'm also not properly tuning out sensory information that ought to have faded into the background. Then I get stressed out trying to keep up, which can lead to emotional dysregulation, and this is is not helpful. If I could fix that lag, I think I would engage more in socializing, but I don't know how that would change where I fall on the introvert/extrovert spectrum.
What I would add is that you don't need to focus your efforts deeply on a small number of people. The larger the group, the more surface level the interaction, the easier it is to integrate without deep personal change!
it may not be original, but this isn't a topic I've read much on, unless you count some texts on Nazism, Hans Asperger, and eugenics (I say those were texts about the very explicit "the group is more important than any individual" messaging.)
" Individual identity and sense of self are staked on those values and on belonging to the larger group." I'm going to chew on all of this for awhile (and read some of the links) but especially this line. I often lament feeling like I never belong to any particular group, even when I try and join them, and the last time I was complaining my husband said to me "you don't want to belong to a group. You hate being part of a group. Every time you join one you're miserable and then deliberately flout all their norms." which I think is a BIT harsh. I don't go out of my way to flout norms, I just also don't go out of my way to keep them. Anyway, I have this gut feeling that reading more about the theory you've presented here may help me to understand my conflicting reactions to the idea of Belonging, as well as to understand better why other people seem to react to group belonging in a way that often seems inexplicable to me.
Anyway, thank you for introducing me to this concept. I love when people smarter than me write about concepts I don't know about. It's a fun puzzle to see if I can eventually understand what they're talking about.
It took me a long time to understand that religion was as much about faith as it was community. Do you identify with "ambivert" as an identity at all? https://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/10-signs-you-are-probably-ambivert.html?mid=20150211
I know some people who participate in religion who aren't Believers, because they crave the community and otherwise share the values of the faith community they're in. Or who participate because the faith community they grew up in is a minority where they live, and it's a way of maintaining ties to their culture. Which is still a community based reason.
Hmm. I relate to some but not all of the points on your list, but I've always considered myself more of an introvert. I think, though, that if I want to be more precise I should say that my natural inclination is more object oriented than social oriented - I didn't even see the point in interacting with other people when I was a child. Why bother, when there were books to read and subjects to learn about? (this did not improve my school grades, though - I had to have intrinsic interest in a subject to actually learn it.)
I've grown a better appreciation of other people and now find them interesting such that I genuinely enjoy meeting new people and feel stifled if I only talk to the same people I know well. I feel like I need the novelty of meeting new people to maintain consistent social motivation. I suppose this is at odds with successful social group integration, though. You need to focus your efforts deeply on a small number of people to integrate, and not that I don't have any friends, but making that type of effort to the extent necessary for a *group* never feels worth it. Especially because then they have social norms and expectations, ugh. Which, clearly I can follow some social norms, or I would be in jail or dead. I understand that norms can serve a purpose and I don't think society should have zero norms, but so often they seem like arbitrary methods of delineating who is In or Out of the group. Or, in the case of values/ideology, people reflexively agree with their group/disagree with their opponent group. I understand this is a very useful mental shorthand, because who has time to research literally every possible position on every topic? but it can be frustrating when trying to have a conversation on any topic where I don't already agree with the group consensus.
But also factoring into my social tolerance is the fact that I have an easier time engaging with people in a text based format. In face to face interactions my brain is not very quick at processing social information and also is garbage at filtering out unnecessary information. So I have noticeable lag in reaction time because I can't keep up with speech AND facial expressions AND body language and I'm also not properly tuning out sensory information that ought to have faded into the background. Then I get stressed out trying to keep up, which can lead to emotional dysregulation, and this is is not helpful. If I could fix that lag, I think I would engage more in socializing, but I don't know how that would change where I fall on the introvert/extrovert spectrum.
What I would add is that you don't need to focus your efforts deeply on a small number of people. The larger the group, the more surface level the interaction, the easier it is to integrate without deep personal change!