Why “In Real Life” Still Matters: The Neuroscience of Human Connection

Zoom or IRL?

Pre-COVID this was a no-brainer.  Many of us flew cross-country for a three hour meeting or a one-day conference.  Then, when everything went remote, we discovered the convenience of video conferencing.  It was soon apparent that a lot of in-person meetings would be just as good, or nearly as good, on Zoom.

But, I think we have gone too far.  

Here's some data.  Pre-COVID my lab measured neurologic Immersion, the value the brain obtains from experiences, during IRL events, video conferencing and asynchronous posting on social media.  Surprisingly, across several studies video conferences produced 50-80% of the Immersion as IRL meetings (depending on who the meeting was with).  Even posting to one's followers on X had nearly 50% of the Immersion of IRL conversations.  The brain values social interactions however we get them.

These data show that video conferences are pretty good substitutes for IRL, even if in-person is more valuable, and here's why.  IRL events hit the brain with more information from multiple senses, including touch and smell, that are absent on video.  When we meet in person, we also glean more information from other's faces, a core method to share and understand emotional states.  Meeting in-person also produces higher fidelity in language and prosody.  

But, my lab recently discovered that variations in average Immersion are not the whole story.  Two recently published, peer-reviewed studies uncovered what we had missed.

The first study showed that neurologic Immersion is contagious.  Indeed, it is so contagious that for two people in the same experience, the Immersion of person A accurately predicts the behavior of person B. That is really extraordinary. You may recall from previous blogs that Immersion was developed as a behavioral prediction engine, not a feeling engine, and Immersion data predict outcomes consistently with 90%+ accuracy.  

The second study demonstrated that neurologic synchrony when two people discussed how to earn $500 together, accurately predicted which individuals would trust a stranger, even when either party could, without penalty, privately cheat the other person.  Synchronized brains motivate cooperation even when there is an incentive cheat.  Again, this is extraordinary and explains so much about human behavior.  It is not good intentions that produce cooperation, it is brains enmeshed with each other. 

People often casually say humans are social creatures.  Let's not be casual.  In a true neuroanatomical sense, human brains evolved to unconsciously absorb and share substantial amounts of information with others. Neural synchronization is one way we do this.  You can sometimes feel synchronization when you just "click" with someone.  Two strangers intuit that they can work together, or become friends, or be romantically involved.  The brain networks that processes all three of these social encounters are nearly identical and depend on the Immersion pathway that is driven by the bi-directional interaction of dopamine and oxytocin. 

We are social by design.  We need others to perform at our best.  In real life experiences are not a nice to have, but a necessity if we want to get the most out of what we are doing.  This is true at work, at meetings, and of course with our family and friends.

Capture trust-inducing synchrony at your next event using the super-easy-to-use ImmersionLive kit. It comes in a durable charging carry-case filled with 30 or 64 comfortable sensors that you bring to your event. Just wave a wearable over an iPad and hand it to an attendee at your next conference, training, or branding experience and you'll know for sure how effectively it engages brains and influences behaviors.  You'll also know which parts of the event were excellent and which fell flat because Immersion data is collected passively every second.  Equally importantly, you'll discover which demographic segments had an extraordinary experience and for whom the event was just "blah," all while protecting everyone's privacy. Share these data with the event sponsor to show then exactly how you will make your next experience even better.  ImmersionLive even includes a Return on Experience calculator that uses Immersion data to predict post-event impact.  

In real life, it's the thing we all need.  But, we also need IRL to "wow" our brains so we full processes the experience, authentically connect to others, and create the all-important desire to repeat the event.  Event designers used to guess what worked; Immersion empowers you to know for sure to make IRL rock.  Click here to schedule a demo.