Social Network Interaction Much Less That You’d Think
Stumbled upon a very interesting talk by Stefana Broadbent on TED. It deals with Internet and how it enables intimacy. While the talk in general is quite interesting, I was struck more with how small our social networks really are. This is a topic close to my heart since it concerns the topic of my Master Thesis (Social Network Interaction based on Location).
The idea behind it is that our Social Networks online are not representative of our actual social network. As it turns out, this is in fact the truth: the average person only communicates with 5 – 7 people in their intimate circle, using technology. Facebook is also quite interesting: the average user has about 120 friends but two way communication only takes place between 4 -6 people, depending on your gender.
It does make me realize that Social Networks don’t adequately deal with the fact that our actual relationships are vastly different from those depicted on our online profile.
(Sources are at 1:30)
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I am currently doing my Masters in Interface Design at the University of Applied Sciences in Potsdam, Germany. Dutchman living in Berlin, born in South Africa. - Find out more here
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Christofer Says:
Thank you for sharing this! I found it quite interesting, even though this is what I believe most people had suspected.
I do find though, that we make a lot of “secondary communication” with people that we do not really know, and this has increased considerably due to social networking. We share links, thoughts et cetera and comments on others links or thoughts (just like I am doing now).
What I found interesting with this video is that we do not find it necessary to talk to people at our workplace or on the trains, buses and so forth, when we have the possibility to talk to, for example, our closest friends or wifes at all times. We prefer them to strangers (perhaps obviously). (I even see classmates on their way to school, listening to their iPods instead of talking to each other.) I’m not sure this is an issue, but this kind of “bringing the things you enjoy the most”, your favorite friend in your mobile, or Bob Dylan in your iPod, has made the interest of talking to others go away. And perhaps this also has to do with the fact that we do not find it as interesting with “the other”, when we can look it up and read about that on the Internet.
Just a few thoughts!
Pete Says:
Hey Christofer,
Thanks for the comment. Yes, I think these “weak-ties” are also quite important for our social networks. As for isolation in public transport, I am not really sure whether it used to be any different before, but you definitely have a point that in certain circumstances, we tend to flock together. You might be interested in reading up on the term homophily: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homophily