Social integration: Sndbox Summer Camp Psychology

This is the second task of the sndboxquest created by Hive account@anomadsoul and Hive account@guyfawkes4-20. In this opportunity the chosen topic is “Social integration".

Introduction

We are naturally social beings, interacting between each other is the only way we have to bond and form relationships that were of great importance for our survival in ancient times, and are currently of great importance for our health in modern times. Being social is something so fundamental that even animals have their own way of interacting, while also being able to socialize with other different species, even creating friendships with us humans beings.

The importance of being social in our lives

Sociability is at the core of social learning and emotional well-being. The cooperative ability to engage with others is critical to successful learning communities. | Source

When we don’t get social interaction and have periods of loneliness, our mood and self esteem can be negatively impacted, reducing the amount of energy we need to get along with our daily activities and responsibilities.

The more social integration we get, the more comfortable we will feel and the easier it will be to accomplish any task we have at hand in any context, but especially when it comes to activities in places like classrooms and offices.

I remember back in my school days, there was a year in which the teachers along with the coordinators, decided to mix the different sections in order to make us the students interact with other different students that we didn’t know. This “experiment” of them actually ended up badly because several students (myself included) suffered badly decreases in their average score, and the social interaction in the different classroom sadly wasn’t the same for the majority, people simply missed their group of friends and it had an effect in academic performance of those that were unhappy with the change.

Something similar happened to a family member of mine who is an accountant, and 2 years ago the accounting firm where he is working sent him to Ireland to study and polish his English, with financial benefits also included. It is easy to imagine that the family was very happy for him because it clearly showed he was advancing in his career.

Nevertheless, as time passed, he started to miss the typical social interaction with the people he knew the most and spending quality time with his friends and family, according to him people in Ireland were “colder” than normal and that started to affect his mood, so when it was time to finish his stay in Ireland he was more than happy to do it. The reason was a lack of quality social interaction that was starting to affect him in ways he didn’t expect.

When we don’t get the social interaction we expect we feel as if our thoughts process where interrupted trying to find a way to explain what this is happening.

There was even a little experiment about this subject with babies, in which the mother completely stopped playing with the baby out of a sudden, as well as ignoring everything the baby did by putting a still face and remaining like that.

You can see the short video here, as its very interesting how can even little babies be negatively affected when they lack the social interaction they were expecting. Notice how the baby immediately realizes there is something wrong in 1:07.

… when our need for social relationships is not met, we fall apart mentally and even physically. There are effects on the brain and on the body. Some effects work subtly, through the exposure of multiple body systems to excess amounts of stress hormones. | Source

Its clear that for any group to succeed, its members need to feel welcomed and comfortable, and the best way to achieve this simple thing is with no other way than with basic social interaction.

Of course, when there is new people in a social setting, its necessary to make an effort in order to integrate that individual/s so he can feel comfortable and start to gain some confidence.

The same happen in online communities, the same need in order to give a proper performance exists no matter the circumstances. Hence the great importance of taking an active role so we can help new members give their best and really put a lot of effort into the content they decide to share with this platform. Engaging with them, including them in communities and interacting with them is all what is needed to unlock the potential of new people that are just arriving at this place.

This can be easily seen if we take part of communities which goals is exactly that, to encourage users by interacting with them through various ways, in order for them to feel motivated about their work, and really put their best effort out there. A great community that does this in its discord channel is one I already mentioned in the first quest, the Hive account@promo-mentors community founded by a great community driven guy such as Hive account@futurethinker. I can tell first hand that the users who attend the different workshops offered by the mentors tend to be more active and feel more motivated.

Because as we can see, it doesn't matter how many benefits there are, if the quality of the social interactions is not good enough, people will eventually start to feel like if there is something lacking, and as time pass that feeling will only get stronger and stronger.

Conclusion

After understanding this, we can realize why it is important to constantly include new members in existing communities and engaging with them as much as we can.

A recent example about this subject happened in one of the communities with the best content, the Hive account@steemstem community, in which the users who manage that account were kind of frustrated because there wasn't enough engagement between the members, as they explained in this post and in this one.

Its fair to say, that social interaction is something we all need if what we want is to feel happy with the activities we are doing, no matter what type of activity it is, and as I mentioned before, this applies to activities in "real life" and of course, also to online activities, like the ones we have here in Steem.