Science Quote by Keith Henson

Henson’s line is a cold splash of biology on what we like to romanticize as “culture.” By calling us “social primates,” he collapses influencer clout, office politics, and dinner-party dominance into the same evolutionary scoreboard: who gets looked at, listened to, deferred to. The intent isn’t just to explain attention; it’s to demystify it. Status stops being a vague social vibe and becomes a measurable resource with a payout schedule.

The subtext is mildly accusatory. If attention is “highly rewarding” because it triggers dopamine and endorphins, then our hunger for it isn’t simply vanity or moral failure; it’s an operant-conditioning loop with flesh-and-blood reinforcement. That framing quietly shifts responsibility. It suggests that platforms, workplaces, and even friendships can be engineered to exploit a reward system that predates modern life. When attention is treated like a neurochemical treat, “earning it” starts to resemble “getting a hit.”

Context matters: this is the kind of claim that sits comfortably in late-20th-century evolutionary psychology and the early internet era, when people began noticing that screens could turn social feedback into a machine. Henson’s emphasis on brain chemistry lends authority, but it also carries a warning: if status cues are pharmacologically potent, then mass media and social media aren’t just communication tools. They’re environments that can amplify ancient hierarchies at industrial scale, making the pursuit of attention feel natural, urgent, and endlessly justifiable.