Social Network Blog - g16

In "Birds of a Feather," McPherson et al present a study outlining the tendency of ties to flow towards homophilious relationships. Like many of our past readings, this calculated and socially determined flow challenges our views on an individual's free will in who our ties will be. I wonder if this is a result of natural selection, as homophilious communication is more productive and successful since similar nodes are using the same frame of reference? If we become friends or create new ties with people who are like us already in age, gender, race, or education, then networks can become more and more isolated. This study seems to re-up the value on Burt's structural holes, who can bridge these network gaps. McPherson's findings in regard to residence reiterate our discussion in the first week of class about the illusion of shared interests in many ties, which can be directly linked to spatial proximity and thus greater chance of interaction amongst two people on the same floor of a freshman dorm.

If we wanted to try to reverse this homophily trend (to ensure greater social diversity or something else uninspired), how could this be manipulated? Does that mean we would have to destroy all cultural cues that shape your identity based on these traits if we want to equalize hompophily to be based on personality or character? Fischer's reading last week brought up the notion that people with similar views on urbanism will be more likely to move to the city and thus be in the same geographic location. If where we choose to live also follows these homophilious trends, are we in danger of a society of polarized locational cliques? The idea of distance in terms of social characteristics translating to network distance was discussed again, an important matter Gladwell first mentioned in regards to poverty and connectors in "Lois Weinberg." Our greater communication and interconnectedness with ties in our habitus, seems to present a situation in which people of different SES, race, or age could never be unified in a society. This is when McPherson delineates between status homophily versus value homophily, and the value of unification through political institutions appears more integral to our society than people think. Do you think that our identification with a social network is increased depending on how many social ties the network foments or is the direct cause for? Are churches more integrated into Person A's life because it has strengthened their ties to their family, neighborhood, and introduced him to his wife?
Persons located at great sociological trait distance are very unlikely to interact, which creates the conditions for social differences in any characteristic that is transmitted through social communication. The homophily principle thus localizes communication leading to the development of social niches for human activity and social organization.

Pearson et al analyze cigarette, marijuana, and alcohol use amongst teenagers and the levels of homophily versus assimilation in these groups, in an attempt to help shape future anti-substance abuse policy towards teenagers. Due to the really difficult issues at hand when studying topics as nebulous as teen drug use habits and teen friendship networks, I could not help but view this study as little more than a paranoid parent's handbook on whom to let their kid hang out with. Pearson et al did not contribute much in my opinion to seem more credulous. "The cannabis-ego effect whereby cannabis users tend to name fewer friends also implies that cannabis use tends to make people less socially active. This could tie in with the frequent portrayal of drugtakers as being lethargic." ~That is not very scientific in my opinion, and sounds more like pseudoscience posturing. I would have enjoyed a more ethnographic approach, say similar to Elizabeth Bott's, in which a cohort of teens could be longitudinally observed for five years, and watching network affiliations wax and wane according to substance use. This study, while laboriously detailing results and statistics, omits an important and more interesting discussion of the symbolic interactionism and shared emotional experience nature of teenager substance use and this effect on assimilation in these groups. The act of a group of giddy teenagers transgressing the taboo of smoking is a lot different than a depressing adult's physiological addiction. While Pearson and friends are concerned with the correlation between low rates of sports activities amongst female marijuana smokers, they overlook the social interaction rituals outlined in Howard Becker's theories on becoming a marijuana smoker and these applications to their study. The cannabis homophily is fairly low, at .18, but the cannabis assimilation is much higher, at 3.54. Does this mean teenage marijuana smokers are parasitic entities, entering non-drug using host circles and influencing them all to smoke pot with him or her?

I was intrigued by Hill and Dunbar's novel approach of looking for a human application of the findings on animal neocortex size's restrictions on network size. We have been discussing how social networks mimic neural pathways, and I have wanted to explore this further. Sadly, Hill and Dunbar pick a flippant methodology of evaluating Christmas card exchange in order to evaluate social networks. Hill and Dunbar choose Christmas cards, because they "represent the one time of year when individuals make an effort to contact all those individuals within their social network whose relationships they value." (55) Evaluating card sending is an interesting riff from Wellman's analysis of phone versus face-to-face contact, but there are inherent problems. Christmas cards are relevant to a certain habitus, and this study does not acknowledge that the transmission of Christmas cards is not a universal, unbiased practice but has weighty social motivations and obligations. I had read about Dunbar's rule of 150 in a cultural anthropology class, and I remember us discussing the analogy to the recommended size of about 150 for a Church congregation. There have been studies discussing the maximum number of people's faces one can remember, but I wonder is there a limit to our number or combination of strong/weak ties before we are overwhelmed? Do you believe that there may be cognitive constraints on network size? What is the maximum capacity of our emotion dispersion ability in regards to networks? Do networks over 150 people require more formal organization or bureaucratization to run smoothly and efficiently with relegated emotional payments to each tie (a la a burgeoning independent state)? Do smaller networks or tribes allow for greater informal social control through taboos and the sacred?

Also, Hill and Dunbar find 7 members of our "support clique," just two years after Linda Smith-Lovin finds our important matters discussion partners have dropped to two people. Despite the experimental problems with Hill and Dunbar's experiment, why do you think their findings were of a greater number?

In "Estimating the size of personal networks," Killworth and friends analyze the total size of personal communication networks in Jacksonville and Mexico City. One of the methods is measuring an individual's ratio of recognized names in a phone book. Killworth also analyzes acquaintance networks in Orange County, and finds that Mexico City has the significantly smallest amongst the three. These findings echo our previous readings' assertions that education increases network heterogeneity and number of weak ties. If we sort of ethnocentrically view these American cities as progressive, expansive networks, can we justify our larger networks as the evolution of successful industrialization, capitalism, and globalization?