On the Hedonic and Agonic Modes of Social Behaviour in Animals and Humans

Dear Reader,

I want to explain to you about "the two modes" of social behaviour as first formulated by Michael R.A. Chance. He called them 'hedonic' and 'agonic'. A few examples from daily life may do more to acquaint you with them than a lot of technical language. Suppose,

you are walking in the street; not in a particular hurry, but you do have an appointment. Suddenly, out of the blue, a biggish dog comes trotting towards you. You don't like dogs; you distrust them. If you were a child, you might run away, thus unintentionally inviting the dog to run after you. Instead, you stop short and brace yourself. Hands in your pockets, you try to avoid the beast's advances. "No, no, no", you utter, with irritation in your voice, hoping the dog's master will appear soon. Perhaps you may turn angry, trying to discourage the animal by shouting at it. Some people even bark. Fortunately, here comes the owner, just as the dog has begun to answer your hostility with proportionate means. If you scold the master too, the dog will not like you better for it.

Now, let us have the scene run again, with a different scenario. You understand dogs, and you enjoy recognising their curiosity as to people. This dog is a stranger to you, so you are on your guard. You don't look straight at it and you talk in a friendly, subdued tone: "Oh, there's a good dog; how good to see you; what's your name?" or any other nonsense in the same vein. The dog sticks out its neck and sniffs your coat and shoes and, yes look, his tail is beginning to waggle. Ten to one that, by the time its master comes around the corner, the dog will be licking your hand. You may not be particularly fond of dogs licking your hand, but it is much better than a growl or a snarl.

Here is another story. I was at school in Rotterdam in the early fifties. Outside the building was a large space of private ground with trees, grass and ditches. Until building activities started. Not far from our windows a great hall was being assembled with the aid of derricks and pulleys. Our Greek teacher, who was also vice-principal, always complained about our progress and the amount of effort we were putting in. He now threatened, repeatedly, that he would have frosted glass put into the lower windows if we couldn't, on our own accord, refrain from watching the proceedings out there. The English teacher had a different way with us. He managed to win our attention by creating a pleasant atmosphere, telling anecdotes about the British when appropriate and letting us read English plays with roles allocated in turns. One morning, he said: "Now look there, outside, there is a kestrel hovering right in front of the window; it is called 'bidden' " [that is 'praying' in Dutch]. And after a while he carried our attention right back into the class-room, as naturally as he had turned it outside. We ended up believing that Greek is wonderful and difficult, and that English is great fun.

Let me complete this series about man-and-dog and master-and-disciple with an episode between adults on equal footing:

In the same fifties, but a little later and in a very different field, there was a serious paradigmatic clash between the American experimental psychologists and the ethology developed in Europe by Konrad Lorenz and Niko Tinbergen. At the American side, Daniel Lehrmann opened the hostilities with a very critical paper hackling some of the ideas of Lorenz and Tinbergen, and a few unpleasant exchanges of fire followed. As seen in retrospect, both parties were responding to key stimuli. The Americans were irritated by the concept of innate behaviour and its evolution, because it reminded them of  'Social Darwinism' and 'Genetic Psychology', American schools of thought they believed they had successfully refuted. The Europeans, on the other hand, feared support for Animal Psychology as propounded by some of their compatriots, whom they accused of anthropomorphism and easy subjectivism.  Looking back, it is difficult to understand the heat. We now have other prejudices...

At a certain point, a small delegation of ethologists including Gerard Baerends, Jan van Iersel and I guess Niko Tinbergen crossed the ocean to talk it over with Daniel Lehrmann and some of his colleagues. As they and their American hosts were waiting for transport at the foreign airport, the atmosphere was tense as they sat together in a corner of a huge, cheerless hall like a hangar. Then, outside, a bird called. Another bird answered. Jan sat up: "can we have a look at them?" It worked like a charm. All present were keen bird-watchers. With this common ground opened up, at once everything looked different.

I do not know whether the conference yielded any important scientific results, but it is certain that the episode at the airfield did something to melt the ice.

What do these little accounts have in common? They are illustrative of two contrasting states of mind and two corresponding modes of communication. On the one hand there is tension, distrust, narrowing of perception, attention focussed on differences, staccato vocalization and inclination to 'fight and flee'; on the other, relaxation, trust, open-mindedness, consciousness of similarities, sostenuto speech and an inclination to 'stay and play'. Whether between humans or animals, these are some of the characteristics of what Michael Chance called, in the same order, the agonic and the hedonic mode.