Social networks and the flu

Oct 9, 2009 8:37 AM

"This hurts me as much as it hurts you." That’s the title of a chapter in Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives. The authors, Nicholas Christakis (physician and social scientist) and James Fowler (political scientists) offer some readable, research-based insights on social networks that made me think afresh about their relevance in my daily life now that we're entering flu season.

The book talks about six degrees of connection. Remember the six degrees of Kevin Bacon game? Well it's actually a factual analogy for how we really are all connected. Connection of this sort may seem pretty abstract—good for a job hunt via LinkedIn, but not so meaningful in everyday life.

Another concept is three-degrees of relevance, suggesting that influence occurs within three degrees, so "if we are connected to everyone else by six degrees and we can influence them up to three degrees, …one way to think about ourselves is that each of us can reach about halfway to everyone else on the planet.” If so, then each of us has much more influence and power than we may be aware of, especially those of us who are central in our networks, being a go-to person among family, job, community organization, etc. (You know who you are.)

Connectivity is significant when we’re talking about how things spread—from ideas to diseases—because we actually influence each other through the establishment of behaviors and norms. My take-away is that behaviors are contagious. Just think about the laughter clubs springing up around the world.

Christakis and Fowler link the influence of our networks to the odds of our being obese, whether we smoke, whether we vote, even whether we are happy. Their work applied social network analysis, which produces maps that illustrate how individuals connect to each other in networks and call out those who are potentially most central in the web of connections. Heady stuff, but sure to give renewed confidence to any parent who has to point out that who your children hang out with does matter.

The power of social networks came up again when I read an article in the September 21 issue of Time on how we assess risk related to the flu. An evolutionary advantage is that we rely on emotions to assess many risks rather than logic. This largely unconscious assessment can make all the difference when you are deciding whether to move forward while everyone else running in the opposite direction. But it is not so helpful when you try to assess risk associated with something you can’t see that acts unpredictably - like radiation, greenhouse gases, or the virus that causes the flu.

So if you are getting your cues about risk from your environment, those who surround you—your network —matters. More importantly, as the Connected authors demonstrate, each of us in our networks has more power than we realize to influence others. Be the one assess risk correctly and demonstrate a logical response to the flu—wash your hands, cover your cough, avoid touching your face, when you are sick stay home, and toss the used tissues. If you take these steps to establish these reasonable behaviors and norms—you can make yourself healthy, probably me too.

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