The Neural Representation of the Social World

Abstract

Abstract A crab lives in a submarine space of rocks and open sand and hidden recesses. A ground squirrel, in a space of bolt holes and branching tunnels and leaf-lined bedrooms. A human occupies a physical space of comparable complexity, but in our case it is overwhelmingly obvious that we live also in an intricate space of obligations, duties, entitlements, prohibitions, appointments, debts, affections, insults, allies, contracts, enemies, infatuations, compromises, mutual love, legitimate expectations, and collective ideals. Learning the structure of this social space, learning to recognize the current position of oneself and others within it, and learning to navigate one’s way through that space without personal or social destruction, is at least as important to any human as learning the counterpart skills for purely physical space.