How Your Friends' Friends' Friends Affect Everything You Feel, Think and Do!

I started reading Connected: The Surprising Power of Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives by Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler but couldn't be bothered to finish the book, so I went to their website and downloaded their powerpoint slides summary (I know, shame on me for being so lazy). Technically I've "read" the book now that I know most of the main points so you've got to give me some credit here. Anyways, here are some of the more interesting points that I learned about social networks from this book that I would like to share:

1. We have more control over our social networks than we think:

- we determine the structure of it (how many people we are connected to)

- we influence the density of the interconnections between our family and friends (introducing friends from separate groups to the other)

We control how central we are within our network

2. Our actions’ influence ripples through the network via 3 degrees – you are affected by others you don’t even know!

- The influence disappears after 3 degrees because of

o Intrinsic decay due to the information being corrupted

o Network instability- social ties become unstable at 4+ degrees

o Evolutionary purposes- us evolving in small groups

3. A person is 15% more likely to be happy if directly connected to a happy person

- At 2 degrees, 10% more likely to be happy

- At 3 degrees, 6% more likely to be happy

And each unhappy friend decreases the likelihood of happiness by 7% (Quick, defriend that negative unhappy individual who insisted on being your facebook friend! Haha I kid) J

4. Long term happiness is affected by

- 50% genes ß so we have a set point for personal happiness that’s influenced by our genes

- 10% circumstances

- 40% attitude

5. Most future partners are 2-3 degrees removed from one another

• The interesting thing is: The National Survey of Health and Social Life or “Chicago Sex Survey” reveals:

• 68% of people were introduced to their spouse by a common acquaintance

• 32% met via “self-introduction”

6. People care more about their relative standing rather than their absolute standing in the world

- In fact, in an experiment testing the relative standing phenomenon in the workplace:

- “The majority of people involved said they would rather earn a $33,000 salary with everyone else getting $30,000 than earn $35,000 and have fellow colleagues earn $38,000”

7. Social networks affect relationships by

- Influence opinions and perceptions

- Dictate our position in the network

- For example, we have indirect mate choice: the tendency to choose a partner based on what others value

8. Your Friends’ Friends Can Make You Fat

Wow, I didn’t know how much of an influence social networks could have! The joys of learning something new everyday J I love life. Also, I just accompanied my mom to pick my sister up from starbucks and was too lazy to take off my winter coat. I do look like a turtle poking its head from its shell. It's super attractive I know...