Jacques Launay
Biographic Data
| ID | 1374411 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Jacques Launay |
| GIVEN NAMES | Jacques |
| FAMILY NAME | Launay |
| SIGNATURE | LAUNAY J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Oxford |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4266-6834 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 16 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 14 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2014 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
You Don’t Know What You’ve Got Till It’s Gone: What Do Choir Members Miss When They Can No Longer Sing Together
Research examining participation in community choirs suggests that group singing provides choir members with benefits including emotion-regulation, increased positive affect, and reduced stress, as well as social benefits like feelings of support, trust, safety, and connection. During the COVID-19 pandemic community choirs were forced to discontinue in-person rehearsals to avoid spread of the virus. The current study focuses on one such community…
Signals through music and dance: Perceived social bonds and formidability on collective movement
Previous studies have suggested that the prosocial effects which arise following synchrony during music and dance may serve as a mechanism for people to bond socially. However, other research has proposed that synchrony could be a mechanism for signalling coalition to demonstrate fitness, which is expressed by a group's ability to effectively cooperate. In the present studies, we compared these theories by showing participants realistic virtual a…
Défense européenne: Le Lien Franco-Allemand Indispensable
Increased Wellbeing from Social Interaction in a Secular Congregation
Religiosity appears to benefit wellbeing, potentially due to social support offered by religious communities. However, rising secularism implies that fewer people have access to these benefits. To address this problem, we investigated whether these benefits could also be obtained from membership in a secular, quasi-religious community. We conducted a longitudinal study among 92 members of the Sunday Assembly (SA), an international organization of…
Brain and Culture
In order to understand human behavior, studies of both the brain and culture need to be taken into account, as well as complex interactions between these two perspectives. Experimental psychology and cognitive neuroscience tend to emphasize the underlying psychological and neural processes that underpin behavior and might therefore be perceived as reductionist. However, there is much evidence to demonstrate that behavior and the brain are directl…
Silent disco: Dancing in synchrony leads to elevated pain thresholds and social closeness
Singing and social bonding: Changes in connectivity and pain threshold as a function of group size
Is Group Singing Special? Health, Well‐Being and Social Bonds in Community‐Based Adult Education Classes
Evidence demonstrates that group singing improves health and well-being, but the precise mechanisms remain unknown. Given that cohesive social networks also positively influence health, we focus on the social aspects of singing, exploring whether improvements in health and well-being are mediated by stronger social bonds, both to the group as a whole (collective-bonding) and to individual classmates (relational-bonding). To do so, seven newly-for…
The Complexity of Jokes Is Limited by Cognitive Constraints on Mentalizing
Joint attention, shared goals, and social bonding
There has recently been interest in the ways in which coordinated movements encourage coactors to feel socially closer to one another, but this has generally overlooked the importance of necessary precursors to this joint action. Here we target two low-level behaviours involved in social coordination that may mediate a relationship between joint actions and social bonding, namely joint attention and shared goals. Participants engaged in a simple …
Does implied community size predict likeability of a similar stranger?
Homophily, the tendency for people to cluster with similar others, has primarily been studied in terms of proximal, psychological causes, such as a tendency to have positive associations with people who share traits with us. Here we investigate whether homophily could be correlated with perceived group membership, given that sharing traits with other people might signify membership of a specific community. In order to investigate this, we tested …
The ice-breaker effect: Singing mediates fast social bonding
It has been proposed that singing evolved to facilitate social cohesion. However, it remains unclear whether bonding arises out of properties intrinsic to singing or whether any social engagement can have a similar effect. Furthermore, previous research has used one-off singing sessions without exploring the emergence of social bonding over time. In this semi-naturalistic study, we followed newly formed singing and non-singing (crafts or creative…
Synchrony and exertion during dance independently raise pain threshold and encourage social bonding
Group dancing is a ubiquitous human activity that involves exertive synchronized movement to music. It is hypothesized to play a role in social bonding, potentially via the release of endorphins, which are analgesic and reward-inducing, and have been implicated in primate social bonding. We used a 2 × 2 experimental design to examine effects of exertion and synchrony on bonding. Both demonstrated significant independent positive effects on pain t…
Music and social bonding: “Self-Other” Merging and Neurohormonal Mechanisms
It has been suggested that a key function of music during its development and spread amongst human populations was its capacity to create and strengthen social bonds amongst interacting group members. However, the mechanisms by which this occurs have not been fully discussed. In this paper we review evidence supporting two thus far independently investigated mechanisms for this social bonding effect: self-other merging as a consequence of inter-p…
Is Group Singing Special? Health, Well‐Being and Social Bonds in Community‐Based Adult Education Classes
Evidence demonstrates that group singing improves health and well-being, but the precise mechanisms remain unknown. Given that cohesive social networks also positively influence health, we focus on the social aspects of singing, exploring whether improvements in health and well-being are mediated by stronger social bonds, both to the group as a whole (collective-bonding) and to individual classmates (relational-bonding). To do so, seven newly-for…
Joint attention, shared goals, and social bonding
There has recently been interest in the ways in which coordinated movements encourage coactors to feel socially closer to one another, but this has generally overlooked the importance of necessary precursors to this joint action. Here we target two low-level behaviours involved in social coordination that may mediate a relationship between joint actions and social bonding, namely joint attention and shared goals. Participants engaged in a simple …
The Complexity of Jokes Is Limited by Cognitive Constraints on Mentalizing
Music and social bonding: “Self-Other” Merging and Neurohormonal Mechanisms
It has been suggested that a key function of music during its development and spread amongst human populations was its capacity to create and strengthen social bonds amongst interacting group members. However, the mechanisms by which this occurs have not been fully discussed. In this paper we review evidence supporting two thus far independently investigated mechanisms for this social bonding effect: self-other merging as a consequence of inter-p…
Does implied community size predict likeability of a similar stranger?
Homophily, the tendency for people to cluster with similar others, has primarily been studied in terms of proximal, psychological causes, such as a tendency to have positive associations with people who share traits with us. Here we investigate whether homophily could be correlated with perceived group membership, given that sharing traits with other people might signify membership of a specific community. In order to investigate this, we tested …
The ice-breaker effect: Singing mediates fast social bonding
It has been proposed that singing evolved to facilitate social cohesion. However, it remains unclear whether bonding arises out of properties intrinsic to singing or whether any social engagement can have a similar effect. Furthermore, previous research has used one-off singing sessions without exploring the emergence of social bonding over time. In this semi-naturalistic study, we followed newly formed singing and non-singing (crafts or creative…
Synchrony and exertion during dance independently raise pain threshold and encourage social bonding
Group dancing is a ubiquitous human activity that involves exertive synchronized movement to music. It is hypothesized to play a role in social bonding, potentially via the release of endorphins, which are analgesic and reward-inducing, and have been implicated in primate social bonding. We used a 2 × 2 experimental design to examine effects of exertion and synchrony on bonding. Both demonstrated significant independent positive effects on pain t…
Silent disco: Dancing in synchrony leads to elevated pain thresholds and social closeness
Singing and social bonding: Changes in connectivity and pain threshold as a function of group size
Is Group Singing Special? Health, Well‐Being and Social Bonds in Community‐Based Adult Education Classes
Evidence demonstrates that group singing improves health and well-being, but the precise mechanisms remain unknown. Given that cohesive social networks also positively influence health, we focus on the social aspects of singing, exploring whether improvements in health and well-being are mediated by stronger social bonds, both to the group as a whole (collective-bonding) and to individual classmates (relational-bonding). To do so, seven newly-for…
The Complexity of Jokes Is Limited by Cognitive Constraints on Mentalizing
Joint attention, shared goals, and social bonding
There has recently been interest in the ways in which coordinated movements encourage coactors to feel socially closer to one another, but this has generally overlooked the importance of necessary precursors to this joint action. Here we target two low-level behaviours involved in social coordination that may mediate a relationship between joint actions and social bonding, namely joint attention and shared goals. Participants engaged in a simple …
Brain and Culture
In order to understand human behavior, studies of both the brain and culture need to be taken into account, as well as complex interactions between these two perspectives. Experimental psychology and cognitive neuroscience tend to emphasize the underlying psychological and neural processes that underpin behavior and might therefore be perceived as reductionist. However, there is much evidence to demonstrate that behavior and the brain are directl…
Increased Wellbeing from Social Interaction in a Secular Congregation
Religiosity appears to benefit wellbeing, potentially due to social support offered by religious communities. However, rising secularism implies that fewer people have access to these benefits. To address this problem, we investigated whether these benefits could also be obtained from membership in a secular, quasi-religious community. We conducted a longitudinal study among 92 members of the Sunday Assembly (SA), an international organization of…
Défense européenne: Le Lien Franco-Allemand Indispensable
Signals through music and dance: Perceived social bonds and formidability on collective movement
Previous studies have suggested that the prosocial effects which arise following synchrony during music and dance may serve as a mechanism for people to bond socially. However, other research has proposed that synchrony could be a mechanism for signalling coalition to demonstrate fitness, which is expressed by a group's ability to effectively cooperate. In the present studies, we compared these theories by showing participants realistic virtual a…
You Don’t Know What You’ve Got Till It’s Gone: What Do Choir Members Miss When They Can No Longer Sing Together
Research examining participation in community choirs suggests that group singing provides choir members with benefits including emotion-regulation, increased positive affect, and reduced stress, as well as social benefits like feelings of support, trust, safety, and connection. During the COVID-19 pandemic community choirs were forced to discontinue in-person rehearsals to avoid spread of the virus. The current study focuses on one such community…
Psychology (11 works) · Social Psychology (10 works) · Action Observation and Synchronization (6 works) · Closeness (5 works) · Cognitive psychology (5 works) · Communication (5 works) · Singing (5 works) · Neuroscience (4 works) · Developmental psychology (3 works) · Epistemology (3 works)