The role of reciprocity in dynamic interpersonal coordination of physiological rhythms

A central question in social cognition research is how people coordinate their bodily rhythms, and how important reciprocity of interaction is for interpersonal coordination. Previous research has primarily focused on interpersonal action coordination, which has been shown to be facilitated by mechanisms of prediction and mutual adaption. Recent research is beginning to show that people also coordinate their physiological rhythms (i.e., respiration, heart rhythms) when they engage in natural forms of social interaction, such as conversation, choir singing, and rituals. However, the mechanisms underlying interpersonal physiological synchronization remain obscure, and could provide insight into the dynamic mechanisms that underlie continuous and regulatory, rather than instrumental, joint actions. Using real-time biofeedback, we investigated whether people synchronize their respiration rhythms by forming a joint dynamical system through reciprocity of interaction, or by producing more predictable respiration rhythms. Our results show that people are more in-phase synchronized but less phase-locked when interacting bidirectionally versus unidirectionally (online), but there is no difference in synchronization during reciprocal interaction and when adapting unidirectionally (offline) to recordings of respiration signals that emerged during the reciprocal interaction. Moreover, the strength of synchronization is driven by the predictability of the respiration rhythms that emerge in the bidirectional interaction – specifically, the slowing of breathing rhythms and stability of breathing frequencies – rather than the online mutual adaptation itself. These results suggest that coordination is facilitated by the emergence of predictable breathing patterns, rather than reciprocity itself.