"[1]

[Footnote 1: R. S. Woodworth: _Dynamic Psychology_, p. 204.]

The fact is, however, that while social activity is promoted
because individuals find in cooeperation the possibility of the
satisfaction of their egoistic desires, social activity is primarily
brought about through the specifically social tendencies
which are part of our native equipment. It is with these
natural bases of social activity that we shall in this chapter be
particularly concerned. We shall have to take note, in the
first place, of a native tendency to be with other people, to
feel an unlearned sense of comfort in their presence, and
uneasiness if too much separated from them, physically, or in
action, feeling, or thought. Human beings tend, furthermore,
to reproduce sympathetically the emotions of others,
especially those of their own social and economic groups.
Thirdly, man's conduct is natively social in that he is by
nature specifically sensitive to praise and blame, that he will
modify his conduct so as to secure the one and avoid the
other. Finally, besides the specific tendencies to respond to
the presence, the feelings, the actions, and the thoughts of
others, man displays a "capacity for social behavior." And,
as is the case with all native capacities, man has, therefore, a
native interest in group or social activity for its own sake.

The predominantly social character of human behavior has
thus a twofold explanation. It is based, in the first place, on
the group of native tendencies of a social character to which
we have already referred. It is based, secondly, on the necessity
for group activity and cooeperation which the individual
experiences in the satisfaction of his egoistic impulses and
desires. Man, because of his original tendencies, wants to live,
act, think, and feel with others; for the satisfaction of his
nonsocial impulses he must live with others. And in civilized
society human action from almost earliest childhood is in, and
with reference to, a group. Human behavior is thus seen to
be that of an essentially social nature acting in an essentially
social environment. And, as in the case of other instinctive
and habitual activities, human beings experience in social
activity an immediate satisfaction apart from any satisfactions
toward which it may be the instrument.

GREGARIOUSNESS. The "herd instinct" is manifested by
many animals very low in the scale of animal development.
McDougall quotes in this connec