Jakob Sverre Løvstad
CTO, Seema
9 April 2025
I'll allow myself a little tabloid humour in the headline here, but let me also say that the research here is solid despite the light-hearted language. To take the main scientific finding first: It turns out that when we humans are exposed to the risk of infection and disease, we distance ourselves from people we consider to be "the other". The cultural psychologist Michel Gelfand points this out in his book "Rule Makers, Rule Breakers: How Tight and Loose Cultures Wire Our World".
As she explains, there's a pretty obvious reason for this. If we look back in our history and prehistory, it is often the case that dangerous diseases have been brought to us by strangers. It's as simple as the fact that people from different parts of the world have adapted to their environment with immunity, or at least a degree of tolerance, to local bacteria, viruses, food types and so on. And we also carry a lot of strange things in our bodies at all times that we live well with for that very reason.
But when we then got on a ship, a horse or something else that was available in the past, and set off to meet a society with completely different conditions... then we could easily infect them with various things that they were in no way equipped to deal with. This has led to an incredible number of deaths over the years, especially before we had a modern healthcare system with a corresponding understanding of infection control. In addition, of course, there are diseases that are dangerous for everyone regardless of their starting point, which spread to a greater extent when we have contact across geography.
So the reflex is that when we see signs of illness, we stay away from those who are different from ourselves. We tend towards what Gelfand describes as a "tight" culture. Or to quote her directly from her book:
"Strong social norms turn out to be another shield for stopping germs. For example, when people feel more vulnerable to diseases, they tend to have a higher sense of cultural superiority and have more negative views toward other ethnic groups, presumably to avoid the transmission of diseases. And research shows that in times of high levels of disease threat and infant mortality, parents teach their children to be compliant and obedient. By restricting the range of permissible behaviour, strong social norms help thwart the spread of disease and help people mount a coordinated response if and when outbreaks strike. By contrast, loose norms, which allow permissiveness and exploration, can promote risky behaviours that expose people to deadly pathogens and thwart effective response."
My favourite neuroscience guru, Professor Robert Sapolsky from Stanford, also explains this in great detail. In his books "Behave" and "Determined" (among others), he points out that the more advanced functions in the brain are often networked with much simpler parts to achieve desired effects. Relevant in this context is that disgust/contempt for people uses the same brain system as when you see someone throwing up or an infected wound, and get one of those "ouch" reactions that makes you pull away (very simplified).
To summarise: It takes a lot to want to hug a stranger, or someone you see as different, when you sense danger in the form of bacteria or viruses. If we think back to how things unfolded in our recent pandemic, with the cultural impact it also had, it's easy to reflect on how the above unfolds. And perhaps the time right after Covid-19 is also characterised by a world that has had to deal with a massive disease outbreak.
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