Structure In Brain Linked To Varied Social Life

An anonymous reader writes "Scientists have discovered that the amygdala, a small, almond-shaped structure deep within the temporal lobe, is important to a rich and varied social life among humans. The finding was published this week in a new study in Nature Neuroscience and is similar to previous findings in other primate species, which compared the size and complexity of social groups across those species."

Comments

Re:The ultimate coward

[fishexe]

I'm allergic to almonds.

But are you allergic to almond-shaped non-almonds? That is the question.

Amygdala != Almond

Re:And you, have you ever kissed a girl?

[Goldberg's Pants]

I have a wife... But I think after that my amygdala got removed. Socializing? What's that?

training

[Tom]

My personal experience indicates that like so many things, social life is a matter of training, experience and desire. The people who have one actually make the effort and put the time into it, and unsurprisingly, get results. I'm fairly certain that geeks simply consider other things more important. I know if I want to, I can have a party every week and build up a good amount of friends. I know because I've been there, done it, and forgot to get a T-Shirt. But most of the time I simply don't care enough.

A very good (female) friend said not too long ago that keeping her social life up and running is essentially her 2nd full-time job.

Certainly brain structures make it easier for some people. Some people are just naturals, they make friends with the same ease I write a simple web-app. Evolution is great that way, giving some of us these talents and others those. But I'm afraid there will be way too many cheap cop-outs in the comments. "Ah that is why I have no friends." - no, lazybag. It is not that simple.

Re:training

[mangu]

My personal experience indicates that like so many things, social life is a matter of training, experience and desire.

Training and experience, yes, but the real question is why do you have that desire?

Think of an obvious analogy, a castrated animal has no desire for sex. Perhaps the amygdala produces some hormone that causes desire for social interaction. Social training and experience would be the result of that.

Mathematical ability is the same way, one needs training, experience, and desire to become good at math. As a matter of fact, one needs these three elements to become good at *anything*. So, what's the element that causes one to have desire to be good at one field rather than another?

The Truth.

[CuteSteveJobs]

That's right. There's a 1:1 correlation that Girls with big boobs have a big amygdala. Tall guys with high cheekbones and a chin you could trip over also have a big amygdala. I'm glad science has finally proved this.

Re:I wonder how that relates to spatial reasoning

[damaged_sectors]

I suspect it's a matter of time tradeoffs. People who like to bully devote a certain amount of time developing those skills - time others devote to developing other skills.

Most of the plus 140 IQ (Stanford Binet) people I know had poor social skills until their thirties - they studied in class, and did homework while their classmates didn't.

I've an idea that things might have been different if they hadn't been alienated in their early schooling years.

Yes - I was one of them. By Form 4 (Year something these days) most of the people I spent my time around had more common ground with me and things changed. Though Slashdot posters will disagree - these days my social skills exceed those of my former school mates. I still bump into them - they don't travel much, they still associate with the same small group of people, most have divorced, and all of them speak only one language.

I have no regrets or bitterness about those early years - I often give work to some of my former bullies. I long since developed the skills to be happy and comfortable in any social situation (and learnt to fight). Unlike those that developed their social skills early - my social group includes a large range of different people, age groups, ethnicity, income, opinions. From bikers to bankers. From adversity comes flexibility and strength.

So Psycotria, our schooling was fucked - but have a look at where your bullies are now... do you really want to be like them? Chances are they now want to be like you.