Reciprocity is an implicit, non-legal contractual obligation, unenforcable by any authority apart from one's sense of honor and shame . The informal contracts function side by side with the formal contracts of society like buying and selling, marriage, the natural covenant with God, and the like. The dyadic contract cross-cuts the formal contracts of the culture, serving as the glue that holds together for long or short terms, and enabling the social interdependence necessary for life. Such persons internalize and make their own what others say, do, and think about them, because they believe it is necessary, for being human, to live out the expectations of others. Such persons need to test this interrelatedness, with the focus of attention away from ego, on the demands and expectations of others who can grant or withhold reputation.
Every individual is perceived as embedded in some other, in a sequence of embeddedness.
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