Creating Buzz

Social interaction promotes the spread of values, attitudes, and behaviors. Here, we report on neural responses to ideas that are destined to spread. We scanned message communicators using functional MRI during their initial exposure to the to-be-communicated ideas. These message communicators then had the opportunity to spread the messages and their corresponding subjective evaluations to message recipients outside the scanner. Successful ideas were associated with neural responses in the communicators’ mentalizing systems and reward systems when they first heard the messages, prior to spreading them. Similarly, individuals more able to spread their own views to others produced greater mentalizing-system activity during initial encoding. Unlike prior social-influence studies that focused on the individuals being influenced, this investigation focused on the brains of influencers. Successful social influence is reliably associated with an influencer-to-be’s state of mind when first encoding ideas.

[1]  R Core Team,et al.  R: A language and environment for statistical computing. , 2014 .

[2]  R. Poldrack.  The role of fMRI in Cognitive Neuroscience: where do we stand? , 2008, Current Opinion in Neurobiology.

[3]  Katherine L. Milkman,et al.  What Makes Online Content Viral? , 2012 .

[4]  Chris Volinsky,et al.  Network-Based Marketing: Identifying Likely Adopters Via Consumer Networks , 2006, math/0606278.

[5]  E. Rogers,et al.  Diffusion of innovations , 1964, Encyclopedia of Sport Management.

[6]  Jure Leskovec,et al.  The dynamics of viral marketing , 2005, EC '06.

[7]  G. Fernández,et al.  Reinforcement Learning Signal Predicts Social Conformity , 2009, Neuron.

[8]  Noah J. Goldstein,et al.  Social influence: compliance and conformity. , 2004, Annual review of psychology.

[9]  Timothy D. Wilson,et al.  Telling more than we can know: Verbal reports on mental processes. , 1977 .

[10]  Emily B. Falk,et al.  An imaging genetics approach to understanding social influence , 2012, Front. Hum. Neurosci..

[11]  Balaji Rajagopalan,et al.  Knowledge-sharing and influence in online social networks via viral marketing , 2003, CACM.

[12]  C. Frith,et al.  Meeting of minds: the medial frontal cortex and social cognition , 2006, Nature Reviews Neuroscience.

[13]  J. Binder,et al.  A Parametric Manipulation of Factors Affecting Task-induced Deactivation in Functional Neuroimaging , 2003, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience.

[14]  R. Dolan,et al.  How the Opinion of Others Affects Our Valuation of Objects , 2010, Current Biology.

[15]  Alice H. Eagly,et al.  Heuristic and systematic information processing within and beyond the persuasion context. , 1989 .

[16]  Malia Mason,et al.  Neural Mechanisms of Social Influence , 2009 .

[17]  N. Niven,et al.  Health psychology. , 1982, Nursing times.

[18]  Jason P. Mitchell,et al.  Social Influence Modulates the Neural Computation of Value , 2011, Psychological science.

[19]  Adrian Bangerter,et al.  The Mozart effect: tracking the evolution of a scientific legend. , 2004, The British journal of social psychology.

[20]  H. Kelley,et al.  Communication and Persuasion: Psychological Studies of Opinion Change , 1982 .

[21]  Scott T. Grafton,et al.  Wandering Minds: The Default Network and Stimulus-Independent Thought , 2007, Science.

[22]  Guillén Fernández,et al.  Brain Mechanisms of Persuasion: How "Expert Power" Modulates Memory and Attitudes , 2008, Social cognitive and affective neuroscience.

[23]  Emily B. Falk,et al.  The Neural Correlates of Persuasion: A Common Network across Cultures and Media , 2010, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience.

[24]  M. Lieberman.  Social Cognitive Neuroscience , 2010 .

[25]  Matthew J. Salganik,et al.  Experimental Study of Inequality and Unpredictability in an Artificial Cultural Market , 2006, Science.

[26]  G. Lilien,et al.  A multi-stage model of word-of-mouth influence through viral marketing , 2008 .

[27]  D. Ariely,et al.  Neuromarketing: the hope and hype of neuroimaging in business , 2010, Nature Reviews Neuroscience.

[28]  Emily B. Falk,et al.  Predicting Persuasion-Induced Behavior Change from the Brain , 2010, The Journal of Neuroscience.

[29]  S. Asch.  Opinions and Social Pressure , 1955, Nature.

[30]  Elliot T. Berkman,et al.  Neural activity during health messaging predicts reductions in smoking above and beyond self-report. , 2011, Health psychology : official journal of the Division of Health Psychology, American Psychological Association.

[31]  Elliot T. Berkman,et al.  Evidence for social working memory from a parametric functional MRI study , 2012, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[32]  E. Katz.  The Two-Step Flow of Communication: An Up-To-Date Report on an Hypothesis , 1957 .

[33]  Lada A. Adamic,et al.  Social influence and the diffusion of user-created content , 2009, EC '09.

[34]  U. Hasson,et al.  Speaker–listener neural coupling underlies successful communication , 2010, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[35]  John T. Cacioppo,et al.  The Elaboration Likelihood Model of Persuasion , 1986, Advances in Experimental Social Psychology.

[36]  J. O'Doherty,et al.  Marketing actions can modulate neural representations of experienced pleasantness , 2008, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[37]  S. Fiske,et al.  The Handbook of Social Psychology , 1935 .

[38]  Robin I. M. Dunbar,et al.  Primate cognition: from ‘what now?’ to ‘what if?’ , 2003, Trends in Cognitive Sciences.

[39]  G. Fernández,et al.  Downregulation of the Posterior Medial Frontal Cortex Prevents Social Conformity , 2011, The Journal of Neuroscience.

[40]  Kristina M. Visscher,et al.  The neural bases of momentary lapses in attention , 2006, Nature Neuroscience.

[41]  Peter A. Dacin,et al.  Spreading the word: Investigating antecedents of consumers’ positive word-of-mouth intentions and behaviors in a retailing context , 2005 .