The Social Animal Book Summary - The Social Animal Book explained in key points

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The Social Animal summary

Name: The Social Animal
Rating: 4.2 (98 reviews)
Author: David Brooks

David Brooks

The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement

4.2 (98 ratings)

23 mins

Topics

Inspiration Class Success

Table of Contents

The Social Animal
Summary of 10 key ideas

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Key idea 1 of 10

What’s in it for me? Find out why you have less control of your behavior than you think.

Next time you go to a supermarket, try to listen carefully as you’re walking through the aisles. Is there a faint jungle sound playing in the background while you’re in the fruit section? The soft rush of rolling waves at the fish counter? Research has shown that these kinds of sounds increase customer experience and make customers slow down, which in turn makes them buy more.

Does this sound strange?

These blinks will show you that you’re far less in control of your behavior than you think. In fact, research has shown that everything from the way you walk and the wine you choose, to how you look back at your life, are all controlled – in often surprising ways – by forces of which you are unaware.

In these blinks you’ll learn

why the love of your life is probably closer than you think;
why judges should eat more often; and
what it takes to resist a marshmallow.

We subconsciously choose mates who resemble us and conform to certain physical criteria.

Ask any 15-year-old boy and he’ll give you a laundry list of traits his dream girl would possess. But chances are, that kid will grow up and fall in love with someone who doesn’t perfectly meet his criteria. So, what actually enamours our teen? And why do any of us fall in love?

It turns out we’re subconsciously attracted to people who resemble us and have similar facial features. For instance, if our noses have a similar breadth and there’s a comparable amount of distance between our eyes.

Furthermore, we’re drawn to people who share our educational, economic and ethnic background. Consider the fact that a 1950s study found that more than half of the couples who applied for marriage in Columbus, Ohio lived no more than 16 blocks apart when they started to date. And what’s more, 37 percent of the couples lived within five blocks of each other!

So, generally speaking, we’re more likely to fall in love with people who share our attitudes, expectations and interests. However, we also gravitate toward people who have certain generic physical features.

For instance, it won’t surprise you that on average, heterosexual women prefer tall men with symmetrical facial features who are slightly older and stronger than the women themselves. But did you know that researchers have also established that women are more sexually attracted to men with large pupils?

And what do heterosexual men prefer in women? According to a massive study conducted across the globe, men unequivocally prefer women with a hip-to-waist ratio of roughly 0.7.

Although hip-to-waist ratio is overwhelmingly the most important factor, men also prefer full lips, clear skin and lustrous hair.

Context determines our choices.

We all like to think that we’re in control of our behavior. Unfortunately, research shows that’s not really the case. Rather, even the smallest factors can have a massive influence in surprising ways.

It turns out that even hearing a few words can set off a whole string of associations, altering our behavior. For instance, one study had people read a series of words vaguely associated with being elderly: “bingo,” “Florida,” and “ancient.” Then, when the test subjects left the room, researchers observed that they walked more slowly than when they came in.

When it comes to decision making, emotions trump rational deliberation.

Have you ever heard the saying, “Justice is what the judge ate for breakfast?” Well, it turns out there’s empirical proof.

In general, people view things differently depending on whether they’re hungry or full. However, judges are supposed to surpass average humans when it comes to reasoning skills; we like to think that their decisions are always rational and objective, even though ours aren’t.

There are two conflicting theories concerning moral judgment: Rationalism and intuitionism.

What’s the basis of our morality? Is it conscious thought or moral intuition? Philosophers have debated this question for hundreds of years.

And according to one view, moral judgment is based on deliberate reasoning. This is called moral rationalism and its proponents claim that we make moral decisions logically by applying universal principles to a given situation.

When it comes to moral decision making, intuition is more important than rationality.

So, which view is right: moral rationalism or intuitionism? Well, while it’s difficult to say whether sound reasoning leads to moral behavior, it’s clear that emotions and intuition play a major role in moral decision making.

Take psychopaths. Although most people experience an intense visceral response when they see a child being beaten – their blood pressure surges and their palms get sweaty – psychopaths keep their cool.

Rational choice is impossible without emotions.

Mr. Spock’s seemingly infinite capacity for rational thinking might seem desirable. After all, if you didn’t feel so many distracting emotions, you’d be a superb decision maker, right?

Actually, no. As it happens, people without emotions typically don’t make super-rational choices. Instead, they either make foolish choices or none at all.

We’re social animals, born to connect with each other.

As humans, we’re born to connect with each other. In fact, in many ways, we couldn’t even exist without each other.

Of course this is true on a survival level, but it also applies to matters of self-identity. After all, as children, our personalities emerge from the relationship we have with our parents.

You can’t overestimate the unconscious mind, which absorbs and processes massive amounts of information in seconds.

Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, once compared the mind to an iceberg. We can only glimpse a tenth of what’s happening in the brain – that’s the conscious mind or the iceberg’s tip – while the rest of it’s immersed in water, hidden from sight.

But just because it’s hidden from sight doesn’t make it irrelevant. In fact, the unconscious mind can handle enormous amounts of data – way more than our conscious mind – and we rely on all this information to make quick decisions and perform complex tasks.

Conventional measures of intelligence aren’t reliable predictors of success.

Our society values intelligence and most of us probably think that being smart can have a huge impact on our future success in life. And on average, people with high IQs do much better in school and similar environments. But does exceptional brainpower lead to exceptional achievements in other areas as well?

Well, the first thing to understand is that having a high IQ doesn’t mean you’ll have a happy and successful personal life. Because clearly, when it comes to relationships, other abilities – like empathy, willpower, agreeability – trump abstract smarts.

Sensitivity and self-control can have a massive impact on success.

If intelligence isn’t a good measure of future success, which traits can determine whether a child does well later in life?

Sensitivity is an important factor in this respect. And from birth, some children are more sensitive than others. This was established in a study of how 500 children responded to novel stimuli. Researchers found that 20 percent of all newborns startle more easily than others: That is, when confronted with unfamiliar stimuli, their heart rates shot up and they started to cry vigorously.

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What is The Social Animal about?

The Social Animal (2011) reviews a trove of scientific evidence explaining what actually determines human behavior. Our iceberg-like unconscious mind helps us navigate the world with split-second judgment, while certain inborn traits drive us to be successful in life. You’re both a lot – and a lot less – smarter than you think!

Best quote from The Social Animal

Emotion assigns value to things and reason can only make choices on the basis of those valuations.

—David Brooks

Who should read The Social Animal?

Students of human behavior who want to know what makes us tick
Skeptics curious about whether people really are rational beings
Anyone who’s interested in understanding what determines our success in life

About the Author

David Brooks is an American journalist and political commentator best known as a New York Times op-ed columnist. He has also contributed to the New Yorker, Forbes, The Times Literary Supplement and many other esteemed publications.

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