I would suggest you to read a nice review written by K.J. Jantzen and J.A. Kelso: "Neural Coordination Dynamics of Human Sensorimotor Behavior: A Review" (view attach).

The review explains the principles of coordination dynamics and mechanisms governing how patterns of behavior form in space and time.

http://myweb.facstaff.wwu.edu/~jantzek/PDF/Jantzen%26Kelso_Review_2007.pdf

I hope this help you.

Best,

Fascinating question. I had recently posted a more general question looking for research applying neuroscience and other psychological knowledge to sociological phenomena.

I do not have a research link, but i have clinical experience that affirms your idea: in my work with kids and adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder (focusing on those who are pretty verbal), I find that there are both challenges in personal/internal coordination (among the parts of their body, as well as between sensation and language) and also challenges in managing complex social situations. These issues are related because they require complex coordination of parts of the brain, which does not happen well in autism.

Scale this up to the organizational level; maybe there is an "autism-like phenomena within an organization as there is within a brain, where local areas are hyperconnected and undifferentiated, and there is inadequate and dysfunctional connectivity among different areas. If the parallel holds, the organization would have difficulty managing complexity in its environment, and under stress it would lapse into ritualistic behavior.

This is scaling up by analogy. Scaling up directly, getting closer to the point of your question I think, would be to look at the impact of general human body and brain coordination, whether functional or dysfunctional as in autism, and its direct impact on organizational functioning.

Funny that although I work with autism and also in sociology and organizational development (teambuilding, leadership development trainings) and seek the kind of information you are seeking, I did not see the connections and extensions on this issue of communication until you asked your excellent question. Thank you for stimulating and connecting my thoughts. I hope we both can find the kind of research we seek, or come up with it ourselves.

Dorthe Håkonsson and her group at ICOA, Aarhus University, has done some interesting work. Check out her publications at https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Dorthe_Hakonsson/

Also coordination, including notably synchronization and leader-follower relationships has been studied in detail, including with neurocognitive proxies by my colleagues at Interacting Minds:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260841123_Frontal_alpha_oscillations_distinguish_leaders_from_followers_Multivariate_decoding_of_mutually_interacting_brains?ev=srch_pub

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260309585_Does_interaction_matter_Testing_whether_a_confidence_heuristic_can_replace_interaction_in_collective_decision-making?ev=srch_pub

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260425699_Beyond_Synchrony_Complementarity_and_Asynchrony_in_Joint_Action_Summary_of_Topic?ev=prf_pub

IMC is always open to visits, if you find this interesting.

Hope this is helpful!

Article Frontal alpha oscillations distinguish leaders from follower...

Article Does interaction matter? Testing whether a confidence heuris...

Conference Paper Beyond Synchrony: Complementarity and Asynchrony in Joint Ac...

From the perspective of neuropsychology or neurology the term is understoood as movement: from the cerebellum it matches the ability to organize movements. From the basal ganglia it matches copying, mirror movements to learn a pattern. Probably there is few to be linked of these two to organizations.

You can try, executive function, planning or planned behavior.

Would these publications be useful to yourself?

1. Icek Ajzen. The theory of planned behaviour: Reactions and reflections. Psychology and Health Vol. 26, No. 9, September 2011, 1113–1127.

2. Niendam TA. Laird AR. Ray KL. Dean YM. Glahn DC. Carter CS. Meta-analytic evidence for a superordinate cognitive control network subserving diverse executive functions. Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci. 12(2):241-68, 2012 Jun

3. Bailey, Charles E.Cognitive accuracy and intelligent executive function in the brain and in business. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. 1118:122-41, 2007 Nov.

Best,

Mario

Hi,

Thanks all for your valuable comments and references. I have looked through the references, but I can’t really find what I’m looking for. Most are biased towards the neural realm, whereas my main interest is more how the neural and social realms are interrelated. Llinás (2001, p. 64) expressed this as follows: “The most important issue in brain research today is that of the internalization or embedding of the universals of the external world into an internal functional space”.

My line of reasoning is very simple indeed. In order to survive, evolution has brought about certain capabilities for coordinating our actions towards achieving goals that benefit us. Whichever capabilities these are, we must employ them in every situation we encounter, be that making a cup of coffee or coordinating large telecom projects (which I have been deeply involved with). We can’t change our human nature when moving from one situation to another.

So, which are these neural or cognitive coordinative capabilities? In my research I have suggested six different ones, which I believe are all necessary but most likely not sufficient. First, you have to be able to contextualize the situation where the action takes place; to identify relevant things and disregard the rest. Second, you must have the ability to direct your attention to the object in focus for the activity. Third, you must be able to orient yourself spatially in the context. You need to recognize how relevant things are in relation to each other, and what properties you confer upon them. Fourth, you must acquire a sense for the temporal and dynamic structure of the activity; to predict how actions should be carried out in a certain order for achieving the goal. Fifth, you need to routinize actions that are successful in a particular kind of situation. Finally, you must be able to shift attention from one focus to another. A brain lesion that affects any of these capabilities will efficiently arrest coordination. For example, if the superior colliculus is damaged, you cannot shift attention, which is detrimental for acting in the world. For the interested, more details about this approach can be found here: www.neana.se/ICCN-2013.pdf

Thus, my reseach question can be broadly stated as "which are the neural correlates of these six capabilities, and how do they interact?"

So, I guess what I’m looking for are works in a similar vein that bridge the neural and social realm on “equal footing” so to say. Any suggestions are most welcome.

Llinás, R.R. (2001). I of the vortex: from neurons to self. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.