Group Dynamics:

Theory, Research, and Practice

© 2023 American Psychological Association 2023, Vol. 27, No. 3, 171–187
ISSN: 1089-2699 https://doi.org/10.1037/gdn0000199

Quantifying Synchronization in Groups With Three or More Members

Using SyncCalc: The Driver-Empath Model of Group Dynamics

Stephen J. Guastello and Anthony F. Peressini

Department of Psychology, Marquette University
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.

Objectives: This article introduces a nonlinear dynamical systems model to quantify

synchronization among group members with regard to physiological activity or overt
behaviors. Method: The driver-empath model accommodates asymmetries in influence
among group members, separates autocorrelation effects from synchronization with other
group members in time series analysis, accommodates dynamics that could be more
complex than simple oscillators, and produces metrics at the individual, dyadic, and group
levels of analysis. Results: An illustrative example of a team of seven undergraduates in a
group decision-making task is presented with commentary for data preparation and
determining lag length of time series data. The supporting literature summarizes connec-
tions between the group-level synchronization coefficient and group-level workload,
cooperation versus competition dynamics, leadership emergence, and team performance.
Conclusions: The driver-empath model has accumulated substantial external validity for
answering research questions in group dynamics. Suggested new applications include
studying synchrony across different network configurations and possible social fault lines.

Highlights and Implications

• The driver-empath model computes an overall measure of synchrony
that is centered on the most socially receptive person in the group and is applicable
to groups of three to 16 individuals.
• The model can be used with physiological or overt behavioral observations
in time series.
• The model has demonstrated substantial external validity for solving
problems in group-level workload, cooperation versus competition dynamics,
leadership emergence, and team performance.

Keywords: Synchrony, self-organization, nonlinear dynamics, team performance,

autonomic arousal

Synchrony in group dynamics can be observed
as a close mimicry in the behavior of human
individuals, such as their body movements, auto-
nomic arousal, and electroencelphalogram activ-
ity. It is often regarded as a special case of team
coordination when a situation requires physical
movements that are exactly timed, for example, in
synchronized swimming, rowing, military march-
ing, or many of the performing arts. Synchrony of
physical movements such as postural sway, hand
and facial expressions, or speech patterns can
occur spontaneously when mutual mimicry of
behavior is not a performance objective, or
when two people are engaged in a conversation.

This article was published Online First March 2, 2023.
Stephen J. Guastello https://orcid.org/0000-0003-
1059-7341
The production of this article was not funded by any
public or private agency. The authors have no financial
conflicts of interest to report.
Correspondence concerning this article should be ad-
dressed to Stephen J. Guastello, Department of Psychology,
Marquette University, P.O. Box 1881, Milwaukee, WI 53201-
1881, United States. Email: Stephen.guastello@marquette.edu

171
 172 GUASTELLO AND PERESSINI
The majority of studies on synchrony in
human relationships have been based on dyads
rather than larger groups (Kazi et al., 2021).
Occasionally triads were analyzed as three pos-
sible dyads (Jiang et al., 2015; Mønster et al.,
2016). The driver-empath model of group syn-
chrony (Guastello & Peressini, 2017) was
developed as a group-level metric of group or
team synchrony that avoids the potential limita-
tions of alternative techniques. This article is a
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tutorial on the theoretical origins of the driver-
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empath model with a computational illustration
involving seven group members and their
autonomic arousal levels.
The following sections touch briefly on some
problems in group dynamics and team perfor-
mance that could be resolved through the syn-
chronization paradigm. They are followed by
an exposition of the driver-empath model and
its assumptions, the SyncCalc program, and a
supporting program in R script that processes data
into the format used by the SyncCalc program
(Peressini & Guastello, 2016, 2022). The illus-
tration is followed by an overview of the substan-
tive contributions of the driver-empath model
to the understanding of group dynamics and
possible new directions for further research.
Approaches to Group Dynamics
Group Actor–Partner Interdependence
The most common approach to group dynam-
ics, group actor–partner interdependence models
(Kenny & Cook, 1999), expresses the process by
which one member of a dyad influences the other.
The concept produced numerous investigations
at the dyadic and group levels of analysis
(Keum, 2018; Kivlighan, 2021). The dyadic mod-
els consist of as a set of attributes of the target
person and a set of attributes for the partner that
can interact and then converge to influence beha-
viors and outcomes for the target person. Neuroti-
cism, anxiety, conflict, and positive attitudes
are examples of attributes of the target person or
partner that could influence outcomes.
Group actor–partner interdependence models
are organized the same way and express the
influence of the group on each individual
(Kenny & Garcia, 2012). The nuance is that
the partner attributes are the average of measures
from all group members minus that of the target
individuals. The models lend themselves to
hierarchical linear modeling to study group-to-
individual effects and infer causal relations
from an otherwise cross-sectional and time-
static data set.
Constellations of group behavior and internal
alliances, however, are emergent phenomena.
They begin with pairwise interactions among
group members, and after a period of time, they
self-organize into patterns that are adopted by the
members. The consolidated patterns then have a
top-down influence on the current members and
any new members who should join the group
(Kozlowski, 2015; Sawyer, 2005). Thus the static
view of the person–group interaction combined
with its top-down perspective is not sufficient to
illustrate or explain how dyadic alliances form,
whether or not they stabilize as group-level re-
gimes, or how the group as a whole reacts to
changing environmental demands. Research ques-
tions about emergent processes could benefit from
finer-grained time series analysis.
Researchers studying group actor–partner
interdependence have recognized the need for
an expanded use of time series analysis. In one
illustrative application (Gillis et al., 2016),
groups of 10 young adult males participated in
a wilderness camp therapy. Those who held more
positive impressions of the group after initial
contact were hypothesized to be more likely to
engage in more therapeutic sessions and thus
show greater improvement in their conditions.
Results indicated, however, that those who were
more initially positive about the group were not
so engaged, and those who were more engaged
did not show much improvement. The research-
ers recommended that actor–partner interdepen-
dence models be organized as time series analyses
in order to capture time points where therapists
could redirect individuals during the course of
therapy.
In another example, Kivlighan et al. (2022)
studied self-reports of alliances with the group
leader among adult psychiatric participants in
two types of group therapy. They investigated
the specific effects of transient (“state-like”)
alliances that might be observed in particular
sessions and (“trait-like”) alliances that persist
across sessions. The primary result was that
members with stronger persistent alliances
made better progress in therapy to the extent
that other group members also exhibited stronger
persistent alliances (p. 147). By all appearances,
 DRIVER-EMPATH MODEL
emotional synchrony was beneficial to therapeu-
tic outcomes. The study also drew attention to
the heterogeneity of alliances that could also
exist within a group.
Kozlowski (2015) made similar observations
about the need for finer-grained time series when
studying task groups in work organizations. He
suggested using biometric measures of auto-
nomic arousal as supplements to nonobtrusive
behavioral measurements as a means of studying
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emergent processes. The next section on auto-
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nomic arousal, which is central to our approach,
captures the current role of biometrics in work-
related contexts.
Autonomic Signal Interaction and Synchrony
in Groups
The interaction (and synchrony) of autonomic
signals has received attention in human factors
engineering, which is usually focused on person–
machine relationships. It developed a concern
for group dynamics now that multiple people
and machines can become connected into groups
and networks (Guastello, in press). A parallel
development is the increased use of physiological
indicators of cognitive workload (Gawron, 2019;
Matthews & Reinerman-Jones, 2017) and to mon-
itor other aspects of cognitive processing and group
dynamics when groups are performing demanding
tasks, perhaps during an emergency (Gorman et al.,
2020). Cognitive workload and social interaction
produce arousal, thus in principle autonomic sig-
nals contain information about both workload
and group interactions. Studies of autonomic syn-
chrony (e.g., electrodermal [ED] response, heart
rate, heart rate variability, cortical activity) and
other neurodynamic patterns are part of a broader
movement to gain an integrated understanding of
connections between behavioral outcomes and
collective neurocognitive activity (Gorman et al.,
2020; Salas et al., 2015).
The connection between team synchrony
and autonomic arousal was propelled in part by
early reports of stronger autonomic synchrony
connected to better team performance in dyads
(Henning et al., 2001) and larger groups (Elkins
et al., 2009). In the current state of the science,
synchrony of autonomic arousal can occur when
two or more people engage a joint activity or
conversation (Guastello et al., 2006; Kazi et al.,
2021; Palumbo et al., 2017) through any of
173
several phenomena such as emotional contagion
(Hatfield et al., 1993, 2009), empathy, common
focus of attention, (Guastello, Mirabito, &
Peressini, 2020; Palumbo et al., 2017; Stevens
et al., 2014), temporal regularities in the activity
or environment that correspond to repetitious
action, turn-taking among the group members
(Guastello et al., 2017; Henning et al., 2001),
or external timing cues (Torrents et al., 2016).
Thus the limitations of most uses of group
actor-partner interaction models modeling—its
time-static and top-down framework—can be
overcome by adopting a research strategy that
incorporates autonomic signal interaction and
synchrony to understand the dynamics of mutual
influence in groups. The next sections explain
principles of synchrony that are applicable to
many types of systems. Alternative models for
operationalizing synchrony into group dynamics
research are considered next along with problems
associated with them. We then introduce the
driver-empath model. Which uses autonomic
time series data produce a group-level measure
of group synchrony along with some individual
and dyadic metrics. Inasmuch as the applications
of the driver-empath model to date utilized ED
data as the basis of synchrony, special attention is
given to the preparation of ED data for analysis by
SyncCalc. The current status of the synchrony–
performance relationship is detailed later in this
article. We conclude with some speculations
regarding how lessons learned thus far could be
applied to group therapy considerations.
Nonlinear Dynamics and Synchrony
The nonlinear dynamical systems theory of
synchronization characterizes it as “an adjust-
ment of the rhythms of oscillating objects due
to their weak interaction” (Pikovsky et al., 2001,
p. 8). Synchrony is a special case of self-organi-
zation: Systems in a high state of entropy tend
to adopt a new structure that reduces the amount
of internal entropy and improves the performance
and efficiency of both living and nonliving
systems (Haken, 1984; Prigogine & Stengers,
1984). Strogatz (2003) described the minimum
requirements for synchronization as (a) two cou-
pled oscillators, (b) a feedback loop between
them, and (c) a control parameter that speeds up
the oscillating process. When the oscillation speed
reaches a critical point, there is a sudden change
in system behavior, called phase lock, in which
 174 GUASTELLO AND PERESSINI
mutual mimicry is observed with minimal devia-
tions in timing among the contributing entities.
The legendary case of Christiaan Huygens’
(1,629–1,695) two pendulum clocks hanging
from a wooden beam and eventually coming to
oscillate in tandem is an example (Strogatz, 2003).
More complicated chaotic systems, such as neu-
rological circuits, can also exhibit synchronization
(Pikovsky et al., 2001; Stefański, 2009; Whittle,
2010), although it is less likely that they would
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exhibit the distinctive phase lock associated with
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simple oscillators. Synchronization levels thus
range between very tight mimicry (phase lock)
at one extreme and none at all at the other.
Rather than assuming that the contributing
time series of measurements are oscillators, the
driver-empath model starts with the assumption
that the time series originate from low-
dimensional chaotic systems. Low-dimensional
chaos would be evident in time series data re-
flecting a low level of deterministic turbulence
and a fractal dimension ranging between 1.0
and 2.0, which is also known as the range of
self-organized criticality (Bak, 1996). When
systems self-organize, they exhibit greater
patterning of behavioral schemata and less
volatile or random-appearing behavior. Self-
organization is reflected in the formation of a
social structure within the group that is influ-
enced by the demands of the task, application
of skills and tools, physical boundary conditions,
and the particular individuals present. Impor-
tantly, three coupled oscillators are sufficient
to produce chaos (Newhouse et al., 1978).
Thus, even if oscillators were good characteriza-
tions of each individual’s behavior, they produce
chaotic group behavior when they become cou-
pled and self-organize further.
The driver-empath model reflects two further
criteria for the development of the group-level
synchrony coefficient: the separation of the auto-
correlational and cross-correlational effects and
asymmetry in influence among group members.
In the former case, two time series can appear
correlated because the agents that they represent
are following the same path or rule—or watching
the same movie in two separate theaters—and not
because they are exerting any influence on each
other. A time series regression analysis would need
to show that the second time series had an impact
on the first over and above the autocorrelation of
the first (Granger, 1969) in order to conclude that
the cross-correlation was real and not illusory.
It is not uncommon for Person A to have an
impact on Person B that is not reciprocated. As
an example, Levenson and Gottman (1983) col-
lected ED data during structured exercises with
married couples in therapy. Couples exhibiting
two-way influence stood a better chance of
staying married than couples in which A is reac-
tive to B, but B is indifferent to A. In therapist–
client interactions, therapy sessions in which
there was a higher synchrony of body movements
between the client and therapist produced more
satisfactory outcomes (Ramseyer & Tschacher,
2016), but only when the client was following the
therapist and not vice-versa (Ramseyer, 2020).
Close mimicry is only one possible expression
of synchrony. Mimicry in emotional or arousal
perspectives would take the form of one
person’s arousal level positively affecting
another person, and the positive response is
mutual. “They’re feeding off each other’s excite-
ment.” The cross-correlation of time series can
also be negative–positive, such that Person A
induces arousal in Person B, but B has a damp-
ening effect on A (Guastello, 2016). Interactions
can also be negative–negative where both parties
are keeping each other calm.
Alternative Group Synchrony Models
Three other strategies for quantifying group
synchrony should be given brief mention. The
phase clustering method (Elkins et al., 2009;
Richardson et al., 2012) assumes that the data
generators are oscillators that would be in-phase
under fully synchronized conditions. Deviations
from synchrony is the amount of disparity
within each pair of time series (members of a
group) summed over all pairs of time series.
Phase clustering, however, does not accommo-
date asymmetries in influence among group
members, nor does it separate autocorrelation
from synchronization with others (transfer
effects). The assumption of a simple oscillator
structure is not realistic in many situations.
Phase clustering also ignores the possibility
that two time series can be synchronized and
negatively correlated; those seesaw effects are
computed as dyads out of phase with each other.
The second idea that was also rationalized
from phase space analysis uses the velocity of
movement or measurement change as the pri-
mary indicator of synchrony within dyads
(Helm et al., 2012); synchronized dyads should
 DRIVER-EMPATH MODEL
change at the same rate. Dyadic synchrony is
measured as the multiple correlation associated
with Granger causality regression models in
Equations 1–2:
X̂ n = β0 + β1 X n−j ,
X̂ n = β0 + β1 X n−j + β2 Pn−j :
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where X is the time series for the target person,
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and P is the influence from the time series of a
second person to the target person.
The multivariate extension of this technique
(Helm et al., 2018) was framed around dyads
with multiple physiological measures each.
Instead of compiling the dyadic relationships
into a group-level metric, the procedure engages
multilevel modeling to investigate the patterns of
correlation between intrapersonal and interper-
sonal patterns of correlation. Thus the method
does indeed separate autocorrelation from trans-
fer effects and produces directional relationships,
but it does not produce a group synchrony metric.
The third alternative is based on recursion
quantification analysis (RQA), which is a graphic
display of potentially chaotic time series. It
detects patterns in which a value in a continuous
measurement falls within a small radius of itself
later in time. Recurrences are counted irrespec-
tive of the number of time intervals transpiring
between the two points. RQA is accompanied by
several metrics that can be used to distinguish
the patterns, such as percent recurrence and
percent determinism (Aks, 2011; Webber &
Zbilut, 2007). Cross-RQA performs the same
operations, but looks for repetition of values of
one time series to show up on the second
series (Marwan & Kurths, 2003). The multivari-
ate extension for groups, (MdRQA; Coco et al.,
Table 1
Prototype Matrix P of Synchronization Coefficients for a Team With Four Members
From P1 P2
P1 AR1 R12
P2 R21 AR2
P3 R31 R32
… … … …
Pn Rn1 Rn2
P 2 P 2
Empath score Ri1 Ri2
Note. AR = autoregression.
175
2021; Gordon et al., 2021), computes the average
amount of synchrony for each person with all
others in the group. Thus for a triad, three group
measures are produced and all three would be
used as predictors of social outcomes of interest.
(1) As such it does not produce a group-level metric
unless one computes the average of personal
averages; MdRQA also does not separate auto-
(2)
correlation from transfer effects or produce
directional relationships.
Driver-Empath Model
Although synchronization phenomena have
not appeared in the interdependence models,
their focus on the group’s effect on individuals
plays a role in the driver-empath model of
synchrony. The computation for the driver-
empath model begins with the matrix P shown
in Table 1, which is populated with autocorrela-
tions of physiological time series on the diago-
nal. Transfer coefficients on the off-diagonal
entries show the impact of one person on each
of the others. P can accept positive or negative
coefficients for matrix entries. Negative auto-
correlations indicate oscillating functions.
Negative off-diagonal elements reflect dampen-
ing effects between people rather than mutually
exciting effects.
Sums of squared coefficients of the rows and
columns are calculated to produce driver scores
and empath scores respectively. The person with
the largest row total is the driver of the group. The
person with the largest column total is the empath.
In our reasoning, a driver has little or no impact
on group synchronization, either psychologically
or statistically, unless other group members
are responding. From a broader systems perspec-
tive, agents must have sensors for incoming
To
P3 … Pn Driver score
P 2
R13 … R1n
PR1i
R23 … R2n 2
PR2i
AR3 … R3n R23i
… P…2
Rn3 …PARn Rni
P 2
Ri3 … R2in
 176 GUASTELLO AND PERESSINI
information or else the information does not trans-
mit (Sulis, 2016). The connections between team
members and the empath reflects the strongest
synchronization of any one person with the others.
Once the empath in the group has been identi-
fied, the row and column for the empath are
then separated from the matrix for further calcu-
lation. The last calculation is a single number,
synchronization with the empath (SE), which
expresses a global level of synchronization for
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the group.
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The autocorrelations (rii in Table 1) and the
transfer coefficients (rij) are produced by ordinary
least squares (OLS) linear regression with
Equations 1–2. The diagonal values would be
the β1 in Equations 1–2. The off-diagonal va-
lues would be β2 in Equation 2.
There are several reasons why the linear
dyadic model would be a good fit. The first is
topological: Two observations that are made
close together in time would be efficiently
connected by a line. It is only when enough points
are collected that it is possible to see a global
nonlinear trend (Wiggins, 1988). If there is
enough lag time between successive pairs of
observations, a nonlinear model could produce
a more accurate result than a linear model
(Guastello & Gregson, 2011). The second is
that Equation 1 can produce globally nonlinear
trends in the form of exponential expansion
or exponential decay.
Third, mathematical simulation studies by
Stefański (2009) showed that linear models are
sufficient for characterizing pairwise levels of
synchrony to the extent that the agents are
operating under homogeneous conditions and
the time intervals between observations are
relatively short. If two chaotic generators are
highly synchronized, the relationship between
them is likely to be linear because no further
translational function would be needed to predict
one from the other. Thus the linear relationships
between two time series can be sufficient when
the synchronizing functions are chaotic and both
time series follow the same deterministic rule.
The fourth reason is statistical: Because the
linear regression models in Equations 1–2 are
OLS models, they capture unspecified amounts
of dependent error variance, which indicates that
a nonlinear process is occurring (Guastello &
Gregson, 2011; Ozaki, 2012). Ordinary psycho-
metric error is known as independently and iden-
tically distributed (IID) error when it is observed
in time series; dependent error is non-IID error.
Dependent error variance arises from autocorre-
lation of residuals, complex lag functions, corre-
lations of residuals with true scores, and
sensitivity to initial conditions. In the latter
case, an external shock could enter the system
and induce an IID error at one point in time, but
when the deterministic function iterates over time,
the error also carries through and compounds over
time and becomes non-IID error.
The structure of the nonlinear process
remains unknown, of course, until specific non-
linear models are explicitly tested. A well-chosen
nonlinear model would capture the dependent
error as part of the function. In other words,
what was previously regarded as non-IID error
is actually subsumed as part of the deterministic
nonlinear function (Guastello & Gregson, 2011).
Thus the linear model potentially “cheats” by
including nonlinearities of an unclassified
nature (Guastello & Mirabito, 2018; Guastello
& Peressini, 2021a). This is not to say, however,
that an otherwise well-chosen nonlinear model
captures all the sources of non-IID error. We
return to potentially useful nonlinear dynamic
models later in this article.
Moving forward, the first step after composing
matrix P is to identify the empath, which is the
person with the largest sum of squared column
entries. Second, the column of coefficients for
the empath is removed from P, the empath’s
autocorrelation is dropped, and the remaining
column coefficients become a column vector V′.
Third, the empath’s row is also removed, leaving
a square matrix M. Thus if the original group
consisted of four people, M is a 3 × 3 matrix when
the empath is removed.
Fourth, take the inverse of M and calculate a
vector of weights:
Q = M−1 V′: (3)
The elements (weights) of Q are comparable in
meaning to standardized regression weights
where the empath is a (human) dependent mea-
sure, and the other members of the group are
independent variables. The fifth and final step
produces the synchronization coefficient:
SE = V′Q: (4)
Note that matrices P and M do not contain 1.0
in the diagonal entries, and neither is symmetric
 DRIVER-EMPATH MODEL 177

as would be the case with a standard correlation
matrix. Thus the theoretical range of values for
SE is not confined between 0 and 1. Its population
mean for realistic combinations of diagonal
and off-diagonal values is close to the theoretical
mean of 0.00. The actual mean from the simula-
tions in Guastello and Peressini (2017) is 0.112
(SD = 6.968; standard error = 0.650; 95% CI
[−1.177, 1.402]). SE is approximately normally
distributed and does not have bounded upper or
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2003). The activity was divided into four parts:
(a) Participants watched a video (5 min) that
described the circumstances of their airplane
crashing in a desolate place in northern Canada.
(b) They were given a list of 15 objects that were
retrieved from the crash, which they were asked
to rank order in terms of their value for survival.
(c) The group discussed their ranking and pro-
duced a new set of rankings based on whatever
decision-making strategy the group adopted. (d)

lower limits. They watched the remainder of the video in which

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SE is not affected by matrix size. Thus if
a research result shows differences in SE based
on group size, the effect is a true positive and
not an artifact of the algorithm. Thus no special
adjustments in the computations are needed to
accommodate different group sizes.
In summary, the driver-empath model sepa-
rates autocorrelations from transfer effects,
accommodates asymmetric relationships as
well as reciprocal or dampening effects between
group members, and produces a group-level
metric. Thus it circumvents the problems associ-
ated with the alternative models. Furthermore, if
the time series are strongly oscillating, Equations
1–2 can still be used with a lag time equal to
the cycle length. Contrary to assertions by
Gordon et al. (2021, p. 11), SE is not calculated
as an average of dyadic relationships. It is calcu-
lated relative to the person with the strongest
receptivity in the group—the empath, not the
driver.
Illustrative Example
The following example was drawn from a
recent study (Guastello, Mirabito, & Peressini,
2020) in which 43 groups of three to seven under-
graduates participated in a group decision-making
activity entitled Subarctic Survival (Lafferty,
an expert explained the optimal values for the
15 objects.
The participants wore ED sensors on their
nondominant hands during the first three parts
of the study. One objective of the study was to
determine whether SE varied by part of the study:
watching a video together in the same room,
the individual activity in which everyone re-
mained in the same room together, and the group
activity. The second objective was to determine
the connection between synchrony and team
performance. Team performance was the degree
to which the group’s rankings matched those of
the expert.
Each time series lasted approximately 5 min.
Some preprocessing of data was required before
analysis to determine the optimal lag length
and down-sampling rate, which turned out to
be a down-sampling rate of three observations
per second and a lag of two third-second units. We
return to questions about down-sampling and
lag length later in this article.
The numerical example that follows came from
a group of seven participants during the group
discussion phase of the experiment. The starting
matrix P was composed from Equations 1–2:
(See below)
Driver and empath scores were computed
by SyncCalc. In this example, the driver was

To1 To2 To3 To4 To5 To6 To7 Driver Score

From1 0.8528 0.5446 0.5397 0.5613 0.5726 0.4879 0.4868 2.4330
From2 0.1461 0.7359 0.4360 0.4381 0.4099 0.4230 0.4141 1.4634
From3 0.0837 0.2355 0.6151 0.3105 0.3038 0.2998 0.3858 0.8682
P= From4 0.1284 0.2217 0.4051 0.5926 0.3183 0.3147 0.3776 0.9240
From5 0.0904 0.2600 0.3428 0.4175 0.7088 0.3692 0.4529 1.2114
From6 0.1166 0.2000 0.3168 0.3198 0.3121 0.5983 0.3896 0.8633
From7 0.0623 0.1480 0.2352 0.2695 0.1801 0.2198 0.5531 0.5404
Empath Score 0.7978 1.0722 1.2970 1.3038 1.3217 1.1485 1.3627
 178 GUASTELLO AND PERESSINI

0.8528 0.5446 0.5397 0.5613 0.5726 0.4879

0.1461 0.7359 0.4360 0.4381 0.4099 0.4230
0.0837 0.2355 0.6151 0.3105 0.3038 0.2998
M=
0.1284 0.2217 0.4051 0.5926 0.3183 0.3147
0.0904 0.2600 0.3428 0.4175 0.7088 0.3692
0.1166 0.2000 0.3168 0.3198 0.3121 0.5983
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.

Person 1, and the empath was Person 7. The task, p = .051; R = .483, F(3, 37) = 3.743, p =
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.

reduced vector of coefficients for the empath .019. The results illustrated a profile for success
was as follows: whereby better-performing teams were more
strongly focused on the information presentation,
0.4868 acted more individualistically during the individ-
0.4141 ual task, and acted more like a cohesive group
0.3858 during the group task (Guastello, Mirabito, &
V′ = Peressini, 2020, p. 95).
0.3776
0.4529
0.3896 Preparing Data for SyncCalc

In preparation for using the SyncCalc program

The reduced matrix of coefficients with the
empath removed was as follows:
(See above)
The vector of weights was as follows:
−0.0552
−0.0037
0.2832
Q=
0.1613
0.2649
0.2887
Finally, the SE coefficient for this group and
activity segment was 0.3742.
In the broader scope of the data analysis, the
three mean values of SE were 0.36, 0.34, and 0.31
for the video, individual task, and group task
respectively. One-sample t tests comparing
the samples against the population value of SE
indicated that a substantial level of synchrony
occurred in all three conditions, t(40) = 12.33,
11.34, and 10.00 respectively, all p < .001
(Guastello, Mirabito, & Peressini, 2020, p. 92).
A repeated-measures analysis of variance indi-
cated that differences in SE were not statistically
significant across the three events, F(2, 66) =
2.324, p = .106. The better performing groups
associated with higher levels of synchronization
during the video ( p = .090), lower synchroniza-
tion during the individual task ( p = .004),
and higher synchronization during the group
three major steps are required with respect to
the particular time series data in use. (a) The
data may need to be down-sampled depending
on the source, (b) a lag length needs to be deter-
mined that is appropriate to the application,
and (c) the time-series data must be processed
into a matrix corresponding to the model the
researcher chooses to employ. The third step
can be tedious, so we include an R script to
automate it as described below.
Down-Sampling Biometric Data
Down-sampling may be required when one’s
data stream is too dense for subsequent analysis.
In our case, the BIOPAC MP150 samples ED
data at 200 cycles per second. This rate is far too
dense for an effective time series analysis, par-
ticularly if the experimental task is particularly
long. Neurocognitive time series have a multi-
fractal structure, meaning that there could be
different patterns of events transpiring at differ-
ent time intervals. The shortest, however, are
in the neighborhood of 300–500 ms. Sampling
intervals that are too short could lose true infor-
mation because the neurocognitive process has
not been completed. Intervals that are too short
would introduce signal noise, momentary signal
dropouts and other sources of error, and could
complicate efforts to establish a meaningful lag
length for the time series analysis.
 DRIVER-EMPATH MODEL
When down-sampling within BIOPAC, the
Transform Graph command assigns the
mean value of the time interval to the interval
and presents it as one observation. This procedure
is preferable to the possible alternative of corre-
lating a measurement from a too-short interval
with others later in time. SyncCalc was designed
for use with any biometric or behavioral data.
For some types of data, down-sampling might
not be necessary at all.
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Determining Lag Length
The optimal lag is context-dependent: The
overriding principle is that it takes real time
for an event to occur and exert its influence on
the next event. For instance, neurocognitive,
industrial production, and macroeconomic pro-
cesses all operate on very different time scales.
Social–behavioral data can operate at a scale
of up to a few seconds, and possibly as many as
20 s, depending on the types of utterances, com-
plexity of the cognitive processes, and whether
movement of physical objects is involved. Inas-
much as the brain’s responses to workload appear
to have a lower limit of 300 ms, one-third of a
second is probably the shortest time interval and
lag unit that one can expect. Most biometric data
collected from groups and teams have used a lag of
1 s (Kazi et al., 2021), but longer and shorter lags
may be optimal in some situations.
SPSS and other statistical packages can pro-
duce autocorrelations and partial autocorrelations
using autoregressive integrated moving averages
(Box & Jenkins, 1970). Autoregressive inte-
grated moving averages linear correlations
control for dependent (non-IID) error. Partial
correlations indicate the effect of particular lags
controlling for effects at shorter lags. They could
provide some insight as to the location of primary
and secondary lag effects.
Figure 1 contains graphs of autocorrelation
and partial autocorrelation spectra for two people
in one of the groups in the Subarctic study
(Guastello, Mirabito, & Peressini, 2020). The
trend in Figure 1A for one of the participants is
typical of time series analyses: Autocorrelation is
highest at a lag of 1 unit and decays afterwards.
The partial autocorrelation spectrum (Figure 1B)
indicated some small but significant ( p < .05)
secondary lags after lag 2. The trends for the
other person in Figure 1C and 1D were more
interesting. The optimal lag appeared at lag
179
2 units and additional lags at further intervals
of 2 units; the additional lags were possibly
autonomic responses to other people in the group
who were also responding to other group mem-
bers at a lag of 2 units.
To determine optimal lag length for unfamil-
iar data, we recommend proceeding in a way
similar to that in Guastello and Mirabito (2018):
Spreadsheets of biometric data for the groups
collected in the experiment were uploaded to
SPSS, and OLS autocorrelations were assessed
for the time series at different combinations of
plausible lag lengths and down-sampling rates.
The combination of lags and down-sampling
rates with the largest mean autocorrelation
would be the combination to adopt.
Note that OLS autocorrelations captures the
non-IID error that is actually a hallmark of an
underlying nonlinear process (Guastello &
Gregson, 2011; Ozaki, 2012). Also, it is impor-
tant to maintain consistent lag and down-
sampling choices for all persons, groups, and
experimental conditions throughout the data set
in order to avoid introducing artifacts related to
data handling. A lag of 2 is a good place to begin
with ED data sampled at 1 s or less.
Preparing Matrix for SyncCalc
In order to run, SyncCalc requires a matrix P
of autocorrelations and transfer coefficients as
input. These can be generated with any statistics
package desired, but can be quite tedious
and time intensive. In order to facilitate this
procedure, we created a script in R (proc-
players2.r) that will analyze the time series
analysis for the downsampling and lag analysis
and generate a matrix suitable for direct input
into the SyncCalc program. The script produces
(a) detailed output for all the regression analyses,
(b) a brief summary of that output, and (c) the
matrices for input to SyncCalc.
To use the R routines, the data should be
organized on an EXCEL spreadsheet that con-
tains the time marker in the first column, and
one column for each person in the group; both
items are produced automatically in BIOPAC.
There should be no additional columns. The
names of the measurements should appear on
the top row and edited to remove nonalphanu-
meric characters. The first observations should
start on the second row with no additional rows
for headings. The spreadsheet must then be saved
 180 GUASTELLO AND PERESSINI

Figure 1
Time Series Analysis for Two Members of a Group Participating in the Subarctic Survival Experiment
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.

Note. A: Autocorrelation spectrum (ACF) for Person 1. B: Partial ACF for Person 1. C: ACF for Person 2. D: Partial ACF for
Person 2. Horizontal bars indicate the upper and lower limits of the 95% confidence interval. From “Time Granularity, Lag
Length, and Down-Sampling Rates for Neurocognitive Data,” by S. J. Guastello and L. Mirabito, 2018, Nonlinear Dynamics,
Psychology, and Life Sciences, 22(4), p. 460. Copyright 2018 by the Society for Chaos Theory in Psychology & Life
Sciences. Reprinted with permission of the Society for Chaos Theory in Psychology & Life Sciences. See the online article for
the color version of this figure.

as a comma separated variables file for SyncCalc
to access. From that point, procplayers2.r
can be run as an R script in the usual way.
Recall that the precise matrix generated is
dependent upon the model one chooses for the
data. In our discussion above, we focused on a
linear model (Equations 1–2) in the foregoing
discussion because it is the dyadic model used
most often with SyncCalc to date. The linear
matrix will be output to a file with the suffix
“-lMat.txt.” So if your data file is called
MyData.txt, SyncCalc will generate the linear
model matrix in a file called MyData-
lMat.txt, and the detailed calculation will
be output to MyData-out.txt. The R script
also produces matrices corresponding to three
other nonlinear models, which are discussed in
the next section of this article.
There are two lines of the R script that analysis.
One defines the intended lag length (scroll down
the script file to see it):
LAG <- 1
The numeral 1 indicates a lag of one unit. It can
be changed to 2, 3, etc., as needed. The other is
COLUMNS_TO_IGNORE <- 0
The numeral 0 tells the program not to exclude
any of the columns in the spreadsheet from the
analysis. If 0 is changed to numeral 1, the program
will ignore the last column in the spreadsheet. If
0 is changed to 2, it will ignore the last two
 DRIVER-EMPATH MODEL
columns, etc. This code can be used in studies that
involve separating two interacting teams that are
recorded simultaneously.
From this point on, the R script centers the
time series and converts millivolts to microsie-
mens by multiplying the data by −1,000; this
function (called tConvert) can be customized
as needed. After that the routine constructs the
matrix of autocorrelations and transfer coeffi-
cients for a linear model using the standard
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built in R routine lm. (It also calculates three
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
other matrices for nonlinear models as described
in the next section.) Finally, it generates a
summary of the calculations in a file called
MyData-sum.txt.
Nonlinear Dynamical Dyadic Models
procplayers2.r also produces P using
three different nonlinear models that have
been offered to describe dyadic interactions,
with file names ending in *nl1mat.txt,
*nl2mat.txt, and *.nl3mat.txt.
They are offered as part of a work in progress
to explore synchrony in higher-dimensional
chaotic systems (Guastello & Peressini,
2021a). *nl1mat.txt uses an exponential
structure for the dyadic relationship in place
of Equations 2. Two studies indicated that the
double-exponential model picks up transfer
effects more often (Guastello et al., 2006)
and more often correlates with other important
effects (Guastello, 2016) than the linear mod-
els. The double-exponential model is computed
through nonlinear regression, however, which
is a computational procedure necessitated
by the use of regression weights located in
exponents.
*nl2mat.txt uses a logistic map model in
which each member of a dyad acts as a control
parameter that modulates the dynamics of the
target person. Vallacher et al. (2005) proposed
the logistic map function for synchronized inter-
nal states that could reflect autonomic arousal,
moods, and motivation levels. The logistic map
is the simplest structure that could produce fixed
points (producing linear time series), oscillations,
and chaotic time series, depending on the value
of the control parameter. *.nl3mat.txt em-
ploys an exponential variant of the logistic map.
The four dyadic models were compared through
SyncCalc in a recent study (Guastello & Peressini,
2021a) using ED data from a four-person team
181
playing an emergency response board game against
one human opponent. Results showed that there
was validity to all four models, although the linear
model produced the greatest amount of synchrony
and overall accuracy, followed by the double-
exponential model, followed by a tie between
the two logistic map models. The generalizability
of these results has not yet been determined.
Invoking SyncCalc
SyncCalc produces all the output shown in
the numerical example in a.txt file. To invoke
SyncCalc, the command synccalc My-
Data-lMat.txt will output to the screen.
Alternatively, the command synccalc My-
Data-lMat.txt > out.txt produces the
output in the file out.txt. Figure 2 sum-
marizes the sequence of analytic steps for
described above, from raw time series data to
invoking SyncCalc.
Research Applications of SyncCalc
Substantive research to date using the SE
coefficient has also investigated relationships
between autonomic synchrony and performance,
perceptions of workload, cooperation and com-
petition dynamics, and leadership emergence.
In one series of studies, groups of three to eight
participants played the role of an emergency
response team in a tabletop board game,
The Creature that Ate Sheboygan (Simulation
Productions, 1979), in which they tried to subdue
one or two monsters who were trying to destroy
a city.
For a sample of teams containing three or
four participants and one opponent, greater
synchrony occurred in groups of four. When
data for teams and their opponents were analyzed
together, the opponent was the empath in 38
out of the 59 games played; in those cases the
opponent was more likely to win (Guastello
et al., 2018). For teams with two opponents,
SE was greater when the contesting teams were
analyzed together rather than separately
(Guastello, Palmer, et al., 2020). SE did not
predict team performance in a subsequent
game, but prior wins predicted subsequent syn-
chrony. A later study reported, however, that
synchrony during one three-game experimental
session predicted performance in a session a
week later, once group size was statistically
 182 GUASTELLO AND PERESSINI
Figure 2
Flowchart of Analytic Steps From Raw Data to Final Results
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This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
Note. ARIMA = autoregressive integrated moving averages; ANOVA = analysis of variance; OLS = ordinary least squares.
See the online article for the color version of this figure.
controlled (Guastello, Witty, et al., 2020); thus
the synchrony–performance relationship could
be operating on multiple time scales.
In an expanded sample of 44 teams with three
to eight members, workload manipulations
(one vs. two opponents, time pressure) affect
synchrony levels (Guastello et al., 2019). Higher
values of SE were correlated with lower ratings
of coordination demand and higher levels of
communication demand by the team members
at the start of the session; higher values of SE were
also correlated with lower team dissatisfaction
at the end of the session.
There is a tendency in the synchrony literature
to regard the more influential member of a dyad
as the leader and the partner as the follower. That
leader–follower designation does not hold for
groups of three or more members, however. In
two experimental tasks (Guastello, Witty, et al.,
2020), individuals’ driver scores were either
unrelated or negatively related to leadership char-
acteristics. Empath scores, in contrast, were posi-
tively related to leadership characteristics.
Further research could explore conditions that
promote greater autonomic synchrony and those
that would dissuade it. A recent study showed
that stronger SE occurs when the empath-driver
ratio is higher (Guastello & Peressini, 2021b).
The ratio is the highest empath score in the group
divided by the highest driver score in the group.
The empath-driver ratio is naturally lower in
command-and-control environments, and higher
when members of the group interact outside of
the formal chain of communication. Those results
open up numerous possibilities for examining
connections between synchrony and different
social network configurations, social fault lines
within the group, or other meaningful social
outcomes.
SE is indifferent to the data type and not limited
to ED, and only requires time series data. Re-
searchers have started using SE with heart rate
(Danyluck et al., 2020; Rosen, 2021) and photo-
plethysmography (van Eijndhoven et al., 2022)
with team data. At present it is too early to make
further generalizations about the efficacy of the
various physiological measures for detecting
synchrony.
Limitations
A simple research question is whether a group
has synchronized to any meaningful extent or not.
One could employ a one-sample z test using the
 DRIVER-EMPATH MODEL
population mean and standard error cited earlier.
The population standard error is rather large,
however, because it was based on a wide range
of realistic combinations of autocorrelations
and off-diagonal entries (Guastello & Peressini,
2017). Standard errors in real experiments are
much smaller; a more realistic test of the hypothe-
sis can be made by collecting a few samples from a
few groups of a similar nature and using the
sample’s standard error in a one-sample t test as
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in the example above. As a last resort, however, the
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
statistical significance of synchrony in a single
time series can be assessed by collecting samples
of randomly shuffled data and comparing SE from
the target time series against those in the surrogate
sample. Random shuffling preserves the mean,
standard deviation, and distribution of the raw
observations, but breaks up the serial order among
the observations that is produced by deterministic
processes (Moulder et al., 2018).
SE is theoretically capable of producing some
extreme values when diagonal values of P are
very low and off-diagonal values are high. This
condition occurred in about 2% of possible con-
ditions tested in the simulation study (Guastello &
Peressini, 2017). Research is in progress to coun-
teract this possible condition (Peressini &
Guastello, 2021).
SE is not affected by group size up to 16
members. The extrapolation to larger groups has
not yet been explored. We caution interested re-
searchers, however, that the social–psychological
characteristics of larger groups, for example,
those with hierarchical internal relationships,
could present some nuances.
Future Applications
The known applications of the driver-empath
model were concerned with work-related behav-
ior by newly formed groups that did not have
appointed leaders. The group therapy context
presents some new and interesting research
directions for studying synchrony, considering
that there is a therapist leader, and the group is
working on psychological issues germane to their
mental health. Group therapies for clients in
residential treatment bring another nuance which
is that the participants might have relationships
outside of the group that could affect their
interactions within group sessions.
What we have learned so far is that individuals
who have stronger alliances with the therapist,
183
measured by questionnaires at the end of each
session, experience better outcomes if the groups’
average alliance with the therapist is also strong
(Kivlighan et al., 2022). From the vantage point
of synchrony research, we have learned that
movement synchrony in the client–therapist
dyad signals better results from individual ses-
sions and in the longer term (Ramseyer &
Tschacher, 2016) so long as the therapist was
leading the client and not the other way around
(Ramseyer, 2020). Stronger autonomic syn-
chrony occurs when the therapist’s and client’s
empathy levels are higher (Marci et al., 2007;
Palumbo et al., 2017). The movement synchrony
results appear similar to Jiang et al. (2015) who
found greater influence of leaders to followers,
measured by electroencelphalogram, when they
decomposed triads. For larger groups, however,
driver scores were negatively correlated with
leadership ratings, and empath scores were posi-
tively related (Guastello, Witty, et al., 2020).
Based on this incomplete information, one
would speculate that the therapist would be
both a driver and an empath when alliance with
the therapist is strong. With weak alliances, the
therapist might not be either one. SE would be a
low value if the group members did not have
attunement to the therapist in common. The
combination of weak alliances a high SE could
occur, however, if there was a member of the
group demonstrating an unusual amount of nar-
cissistic tendency or disruptive impact on the
group outside of what the therapist might have
deliberately planned. It would be valuable to
organize studies that connect SE to measures
of alliance with the therapist and other critical
events in therapy that signal positive therapeutic
outcomes, such as moments of insight.
Families in therapy, by definition, have rela-
tionships outside of the therapeutic context. The
relationships can be characterized by the “five
Rs:” responses to other family members, rules of
engagement, roles in the family, pairwise rela-
tionships, and subjective realities (Pincus, 2001,
2009). If one were to analyze the content of their
interactions in therapy sessions, unhealthy family
system would display rigid and stereotypic pat-
terns of interaction, whereas a healthy system
would display nuanced and flexible interactions
(Pincus & Guastello, 2005). One can also char-
acterize their interaction patterns in terms of
the “three Cs:” conflict, control, and closeness,
which regulate the flow of information within the
 184 GUASTELLO AND PERESSINI
group (Bales, 1999; Hollander & Offermann,
1990). Thus it would also be valuable to organize
studies that connect SE to different patterns of Rs
and Cs.
Annotated Bibliography
Adamatzky, A. (2005). Dynamics of crowd-
minds: Patterns of irrationality in emotions, be-
liefs, and actions. World Scientific.
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
This is primarily a mathematical text that ex-
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
amines some patterns of diffusion of dysfunc-
tional ideas through large-scale social networks
and how they synchronize and stabilize.
Guastello, S. J., & Liebovitch, L. S. (2009).
Introduction to nonlinear dynamics and complex-
ity. In S. J. Guastello, M. Koopmans, & D.
Pincus. (Eds.), Chaos and complexity in psychol-
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1–40). Cambridge University Press.
This chapter explains basic concepts of non-
linear dynamics, with substantial references, that
are used in various psychological applications,
including group dynamics, throughout the book:
attractors, bifurcations, chaos, fractals, cata-
strophes, and self-organization.
Software Availability
SyncCalc, Procplayers2.r, operation instructions,
and test data are freely available from: https://acade
mic.mu.edu/peressini/synccalc/slinks.htm
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Received December 11, 2021
Revision received October 11, 2022
Accepted January 9, 2023 ▪