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Description
384 participants (218 Males, 55% White, Mage = 35.81) completed a computerized foraging task with others under threat. Results showed that participants are more likely to forage in the presence of other social agents, adjusting for threat and resource availability (p < .001), supporting Social Baseline Theory from behavioral ecology.
Supporting Summary: Objective: Social Baseline Theory (SBT; Beckes & Coan, 2011) states that humans assume proximity to other humans. When this assumption fails, humans perceive an increased demand on their personal resources and capabilities, and health and longevity are compromised. In the presence of efficient coupling, increased foraging and decreased vigilance has been commonly observed across animal research (Kutsukake, 2007; Lanham & Bull, 2004). Gonzalez and colleagues (2021) conceptualized this capitalization of ecological energy conservation in the presence of non-threatening conspecifics as an instance of “yielding”. In other words, yielding refers to one’s capability or willingness to relax physiological investment to social affordances in response to threatening circumstances. Drawing from behavioral ecological research, the present study aims to better understand the concept yielding–an individual willingness to depend on social others in the presence of threat as an ecologically rational behavior. Method: 384 participants (218 Males, 55% White, Mage = 35.81) recruited from Prolific platform online completed a computerized foraging task, “Bears and Berries”, where they forage for virtual berries under the threat of a bear attack. In each game, players find themselves in a berry patch and must decide whether to forage or seek out another patch. While foraging, participants may find themselves with up to 5 other agents. We hypothesized that participants’ foraging choices (leave or forage) depend on resource availability (number of berries available), sensitivity to threat (presence of bear attack), and proximity to social resources (number of other social agents present). They also completed a series of personality and health-related questionnaires. The recruitment plan, hypotheses, and analyses were pre-registered on OSF: https://osf.io/enbjm/. Results: Using generalized linear mixed effect model, results revealed significant main effects of threat (estimate = 2.92, SE = 0.11, p < .001), number of berries available (estimate = -0.91, SE = 0.02, p < .001), and number of other social agents present (estimate = -0.19, SE = 0.01, p < .001). More specifically, participants were more likely to leave the trial (and not forage) when they perceive more threat, fewer berry resources, and encountered fewer other social agents. These effects remain significant after adjusting for demographic information. Canonical correlational analyses revealed that heightened sensitivity to berry resources during the foraging task predicted lower depression outcomes, as measured by Patient Health Questionnaire-9 and higher context sensitivity, as measured by Context Sensitivity Index, after residualizing for demographics, and videogame proficiency. Discussion: The present study is among the first to test Social Baseline Theory, using a behavioral ecology framework. Our findings showed that regression coefficient on social agents remains significant after adjusting for resource and threat availability on a given trial, suggesting that people prefer to be around others innately regardless of threat and resources. This study has significance in integrating interdisciplinary research, broadening understanding of yielding among human research, and demonstrating central tenets of social baseline theory in a behavioral ecological framework. Based on existing theoretical foundation on the role of allostasis in physical (Guidi et al., 2021) and mental health (Barrett et al., 2016), current findings will inform future efforts using physiological and imaging measures, in order to better understand the role of yielding in human social relationships and health.
