Power, emotion and mimesis

I find this very intriguing in relationship to thinking about the 'mechanics' of bonding and ethos in corporisations. It's from this article: The Social Brain | LinkedIn it's expressed succinctly towards the beginning:

Who sends the emotions that pass between people, and who receives them? One answer, for groups of peers, is that the sender tends to be the most emotionally expressive person in the group. But in groups where there are power differences – in the classroom, at work, in organizations generally – it is the most powerful person who is the emotional sender, setting the emotional state for the rest of the group.

This sounds plausible and would seem to relate to things known in Rhetoric (think Nuremburg rallies) and churches (recent research about megachurches and worship experiences). It implies ethical responsibilities for those in leadership and it implies mirror-image ethical responsibilities to do with self-awareness about the effects upon us of leaders' influence and taking back agency.

The glue of a group can, in part, be this emotional mimesis/resonance. But, obviously, it can be disrupted by understanding what happens and/or by being committed to an alternate path or vision to that of the leader.