Breaking the Network

So far in the course, I’m starting to see networks as having more effect on us than the other way around. It’s somehow becoming another variable to be added to the list of things that ultimately determines the course of our lives, such as economic determinism or cultural determinism and so on. We can be thinking of a network-determinism that affects our entire lives, or basically guides and shapes them. It looks to me that once you are born in a certain network with certain attributes (socioeconomic status, education, size,..), this will first of all shape who you are, what kind of network you are likely to build and remain in and so it shapes you life. What sustains this is that there is also a flow of norms within each network. The only way to break the network seems to literally break it and start from scratch, especially if you want to stand out in a strong way that will not conform with your existing network. But I think that’s something of extraordinary difficulty considering that change itself is a huge burden, and so adding the factor of replacing the social networks is a barrier strong enough that hinders most people from changing. That’s why I think cycles such as the poverty cycle are usually self-sustainable and permanent until it’s broken by an external force. This force can be someone within who choose to go against all the norms and spend his life to do so (MLK, Ghandi,…), or an external factor that causes that network to naturally break and reshape (natural disaster, war, death, diffusion of idea/behavior,…). There are things that affect these factors such as the propensity of population for change (it might be easier to break a whole network and rebuild it in the US as opposed to Egypt). Also, how strong and how large family ties are and their position in the social network (it’s easier to break in an individualistic society where nuclear families are the norm as opposed to a collectivistic society where extended families are the norm). There is also the question of can we replace only a part of our network and how stable will that be in a highly clustered one. I also think that we are living in an age (especially in the west) where our strong ties are actually decreasing as we keep moving from one place to another and changing careers and postponing marriage. All of this cased our weak ties (and overall network) to increase but our strong ones I think are decreasing, which maybe makes breaking our networks and starting from scratch (new career, new wife/husband, new city/country,..) much easier.

The Arab revolutions , and the weak ties between nations.

Writers and intellectuals are still and will continue for year to come to debate the exact nature of what triggered the first spark in Tunisia allowing a domino effect to take place throughout the entire Arab world. It’s hard to understand why did it take place exactly now, and not one year or two years ago. Tunisia, and most of the Arab world did not become much worse in the last few years. According to many sources such as the UN report on Arab development, the Arab world indeed has been taking many steps backwards at all levels (social, economic, political,..). But the decrease has been small and steady, but maybe it reached a critical mass phase, or a threshold some time ago and it has been just waiting for the right trigger to explode. It’s hard as we said to understand how the first spark started, but maybe it’s easer to understand the diffusion which goes through the weak ties as Granovetter argued. For the sake of simplification, we can view entire nations of the Arab world as one social networks, highly clustered through strong ties with weak ties connecting it to the globe, brining in new ideas and perspectives. From this angle, the social movements or revolutions that took place sequentially in Georgia then in Ukraine between 2003-2004 should be fairly enough triggers for the Arab world to follow their steps. But they weren’t. So maybe ideas and innovations can flow through weak ties, but there is a distinction between merely receiving the idea/innovation and accepting and acting upon it. We know that to diffuse behavior we need reinforcement from strong ties in the network, but I think that in order to diffuse the idea that caused that behavior you need a certain threshold of homphily in the weak ties that brings it to you. In other words, we can hear X a hundred times and not act upon it. But when we hear it from a certain source (with a threshold of homophily as in Arab country to an Arab country), then it’s much easier accepted and the reinforcement by strong ties is much more immediate and profound as we saw in the case of Egypt, Libya and other Arab countries that will follow.

How social networks determine college majors and future careers

Up to this point, probably the most intriguing ideas in networks is how we affect those around us, but more importantly how they fundamentally affect our lives. This is the main concept that Christakis kept examining in his book. That sometimes it’s not who we are or who we know are, but rather it’s the connections between all of that and our location in the resulting network. I grew up in Saudi Arabia, where I had my family divided between three main branches so to speak. The East, middle and west parts of the country. So, I naturally had to travel extensively between these three parts to in part to make everyone happy and keep with cultural/religious traditions of close family ties and partly just because I was able to ( i.e. free transportation/housing!). While going back and forth over the year there were very interesting and distinctive patterns between all the three regions. The eastern region, and specifically where I live with my father is a place where two main things stand out. Aramco (the world’ largest oil company), and KFUPM (a very highly selective and prestigious technical university). The situation in the middle and the west is not similar ( i.e. nothing really stands out). Up to this day I’m yet to find a satisfactory answer to the following phenomenon, that I keep witnessing every year. When I graduated from high school, almost my entire class (300+ kids), went to the same university KFUPM (my school was an above average school so most students were able to gain admission to KFUPM). At KFUPM, almost all of them (75%), and that’s just from the people I know and through Facebook chose one major, chemical engineering. Now there are defiantly many factors in why they choose both KFUPM (over all the other schools in the region and the country), and chemical engineering (over all the other majors). These might include, their ability (not interest ) to do so, the promise of good jobs, lack of knowledge of other options (most of us had no clue) and so on. But looking at it from a network point of view makes a more persuasive case. KFUPM was created roughly right after Aramco to serve its needs. From nothing the whole region grew bit by bit, and a special community (which I was born to) was created around the school and the company. Over the years it became a network of generations of parents and children. You grow up surrounded by most people who work in Aramco, and their children study with you. When it’s time for you to make a decision, the first place you look into is your network, and that decides where to go. The choice of major diffuses through the network every year for one reason or the other (one year it’s all mechanical, the other petroleum, and so on), and soon the majority are following in step. What still puzzles me is that I often ask people why did you choose “chemical engineering” and I’m yet to hear an expected answer at least here in the US such as “I’m good at chemistry,” or “I enjoy science”, and so forth. Instead, you will literally hear, “that’s what everyone is doing this year.” They don’t want to stand out, or be outsiders in a weird way. I realize this needs much more analysis and examining other variables, but I just think it’s really interesting how our networks simply decides our majors, and plans our lives for us.

TED, and the non-human opinion leader

When we discussed in class the topic of diffusion in networks whether in disease, emotion, ideas or behavior, I remembered a TED talk that I saw not long ago about Seth Godin on standing out, and how and what will diffuse in today’s complex and informationally overloaded world. Seeing Seth talk, or any of the TED presenters for that matter, reminded me of Rogers’s piece of diffusion networks and his discussion on opinion leaders in the two-step flow model. TED is like a tiny condensed world of opinion leaders on every topic imaginable. Since the best of the best are selected to present at TED, we now quite instantly assume a great degree of credibility and innovativeness to a given TED presenter. TED’s motto is ideas worth spreading. I think TED itself although not a person became an opinion leader as it satisfied all the 4 characteristics that Rogers proposed (external communication, accessibility, socioeconomic status, and innovativeness). With its new project of TEDx throughout the globe, it certainly increased its accessibility to a completely new level. When I look back now and see that TEDx actually reached my home overseas with an event at my local university where thousands lined up to watch new “ideas”, I think there can’t be a better example of the diffusion of ideas. But I think that the concept of opinion leaders can be extended to include institutions, and also other agents that are not directly human such as highly esteemed magazines, universities, and think thanks where it’s not nesserily that name of the “person” that matters in influencing opinion but rather the institutions itself. I recently got addicted to NPR. Every now and then when there is a debate on a certain topic (which for some reason there are a lot of them around 8-9 am as I’m going to school). Often one party will use and cite “Harvard, or MIT” research as part of their argument. They won’t say x, or y, they will simply a Harvard research and that’s enough to give credibility and all the traits of an opinion leader. It’s interesting to think how this can expand to include countries as a whole as non-human opinion leaders. When I travel to a third world country , I often hear (as well as use) the argument that this happened in the America, or that has been discovered or made or written about in the US. This is enough to win an argument. Maybe I’m mixing opinion leaders or simplifying them to credibility, but maybe it also depends on who you’re asking, as in less advanced societies credibility and what criteria are needed to influence people re quite different which Rogers also touched upon. In some Sub Sharhan countries where I have many friends, simply anything Western (regardless of how broad this word is ), is enough to impress, influence and change minds (although the product or idea can be found locally right around the corner!).

Mate Copying , cognitive biases, and our networks.

Mate Copying , cognitive biases, and our networks.

I’ve always been intrigued by the idea, and the reality, of humans’ cognitive biases such as confirmation and the framing effect. In our last class Dr. Skyler presented us with an interesting lecture on mate copying through their studies on speed dating. One of the key ideas was that people (observers) will tend to copy in their mating for the simple reason that it’s easier or faster. In other words, it’s a shortcut which is a good alternative word for a cognitive bias. The idea of mate copying is one of these issues that we always knew it existed but somehow never thought deeply about it until it’s pointed out to us. A cognitive bias from an evolutionary perspective is quite interesting in that although it might lead to unwanted results it still persists in humans, meaning that it actually works sometime. Mate copying which can be quite an appealing shortcut, from a network point of view I think it makes networks unstable. In a given triad of a network if you were the observer, and both the target and the model were close friends of yours , and you couldn’t “win” in this copying, tension will arise which might ultimately cause the triad to break affecting the entire network at that side, especially because it involves a sensitive issue as mating. As opposed to other cognitive biases that I can think of, this one brings special danger as it’s tied to our social networks in which it’s hard to get a “one one” situation as someone has eventually to walk away without the target. There is also what Christakis calls the “structural effect” of networks as just in the case of happiness where the existence of social relationships increases happiness, it can increase tension, envy and eventually destruction in the network. They do say that the sea has so much fish in it, but we being humans will usually choose willingly to ignore that fact. So in a given social network if we took a strong cluster in it, and one person X started having strong interest for another person Y, and Z noticed, then Z will have strong interest, according to mate copying. But maybe A, B, and C will also notice Z or notice one another noticing Z in a vicious cycle. Ultimately all will lose except for one , leaving the others feeling disappointed, and maybe carrying a grudge, which again takes me back to my first question of how mate copying a cognitive bias which evolved with human, can persist from an evolutionary point of view, how can it be sustainable if it can potentially lead to the destruction of our networks. Or in our priorities, a shortcut for mating is more important than sustaining networks.

Body Language

This week we had a guest teacher--Skyler Place. He gave a very interesting presentation on speed dating, where we observed a couple's date and tried to determine if one or both of the participants were interested in the other. We also examined whether altering features of the video would change our perception such as blurring out the body or face, removing sound, pinpointing motions, etc. Doing this made me realize how telling body language, especially, is.

The body language of the two participants was the easiest thing to look at when trying to make a judgment. Leaning forward, batting eyelashes, smiling, and flicking the hair are all hints to a person's interest level. This made me think of other scenarios where body language is important as well.

For instance, as we are going through the interview process for co-op positions, I have realized that body language is important in this setting as well. One has to sit and act professionally. We cannot slouch or yawn; these would be considered improper. However, at the same time, we are told not to sit so stiffly that we look nervous and uncomfortable. I was once told that mimicking the posture of the interviewer is a good interviewing trick.

I think examining the body language of participants in a job interview would also make for an interesting study. Although, body language is not the defining element for whether or not a person gets a job, it still plays a small role in the process. For example, certain motions by the interviewer could show his approval or disapproval of the interviewee's response to a question. Body language is a crucial element in communication and I believe that it could be studied in a variety of settings.

Social Capital's effects on crime

While we haven't really spent time in class on this subject I find it very interesting. While original theories suggested that social capital and social organization would decrease crime, recent studies have brought new theories into light. Since poverty and instability decrease the strength of community networks effectiveness it has long believed that organization and strong social networks may be the key to fighting urban neighborhood crime.

However, why then are so many organized communities still suffering from high crime rates? One of the issues the that of social networks and collective efficacy. Collective efficacy is the mutual trust and expectations a community shares to regulate crime in an informal and social environment. Since strong social ties will increase the amount of norms a community has, it will strengthen its collective efficacy. However, because of these strong social ties there could be a decreased rate of enforcing social norms. An example I came across in my research is if an older woman catches a young boy committing a crime, she may not want to report his name to the police if she is friends with the boy's mother. Also with the increase in strong ties, there is also an increase in communication and the spread of information. Therefore if there are criminals in the community, it is easy for one to imagine others being influenced by their behavior.

Crime can also affect social capital, not just the other way around. If a community is filled with crime then the mutual trust in a neighborhood will tend to decrease and network ties, as well as collective efficacy can decrease. However, if a community is filled with crime then they may band together to form neighborhood watch groups or other community groups to fight the crime. In this sense, it could increase network ties and collective efficacy, therefore increasing social capital.

Offline Networking In Brief

Coming into this class, I expected to learn solely about online social networks. Instead of learning about solely Facebook, Twitter, etc., we learned how society as a whole functions through networks. We began by visualizing networks by portraying visually as vastly connected graphs. Each point in the graph, called a node, represents a person, and each line, called an edge, represents a connection between two nodes. We then learned methods of optimizing networks, such as filling structural holes and closing structural triads. Additionally, we learned that edges have different strengths, known as strong and weak ties. Networks of strong ties tend to be more dense and may not be well connected with those outside of the network, whereas weak ties tend to span farther and to more networks, which is known as the strength of weak ties theorem.

After learning graphical analysis of networks, we began to learn about the networks themselves and networking effects. We began with learning about diffusion and contagion, and how ideas and other effects spread across a network. We then explored the six degrees of separation theorem and how the world is connected as a whole. After spending a day learning about online power laws, we finished by exploring speed dating and mate copying. I've learned more about networks in the last two months than I have in the last four years using Facebook. Being able to explore social networks in a whole new way, with large graphs and long contagion paths has brought a new light into my knowledge of networks as a whole.

Power-Law Theory

The reading on the Power-Law theory made me think a lot about various things that are going on in the United States right now. This theory virtually applies to any concept that is driven by the idea of popularity. The law states that as something becomes popular, its popularity increases at an exponential rate. So, for example, the more a blog is read and linked to by others, the more people who will see it and, in turn, link even more people to it. This rich-get-richer idea immediately made me think about entertainment these days. I, for one, hate reading any reviews about movies before they come out. I feel like a lot of buzz goes on about movies before they come out, and it ultimately affects their popularity and success in both the box office and reviews. As a movie gets hyped, it becomes less likely that someone will write a negative comment about it, and it keeps getting hyped up more. The way that movies become exponentially more popular in this way makes it very hard to watch a movie with an objective stand point and make your own opinion. Another way that the Power-Law theory relates to entertainment these days is through reality television. Personally, I think reality television is stupid, and I can’t stand the fact that cast members on The Jersey Shore make more an episode than I do in a year. Reality television started with shows that had interesting ideas, such as Survivor. Viewers began becoming most interested in the characters that had the most ridiculous antics and caused the most drama. Eventually, this interest in reality television spread through the nation, and now nearly ever channel has some sort of reality show. I believe that if we were to air The Jersey Shore in the 70’s, way less people would be interested in it. However, the popularity of reality shows has been exponentially growing, causing even more people to become interested in them.

Mate Copying

I had never thought about the concept of mate copying before reading the article by Place, but it makes a lot of sense. Mate copying is the idea that one’s selection of a mate can be influenced by another’s search. This idea ties in well with past topics that were discussed in class, such as homophily and the power law theory that the rich get richer. For example, with homophily, people tend to have similar thoughts and ideas as those that they associate with. People have always been heavily influenced by those around them, and it is no different with mate copying. This means that if my friends keep talking about how great a certain girl is, I will most likely think the same thing. In terms of the study, if I see a girl on a speed date and all the dates seem interested in her, it is natural that I would become more attracted to her as well. The perceived notion is that she is interesting to talk to and has something good to offer as a mate. This concept ties in very well with the power law theory that the rich get richer. The more that a female is perceived as an attractive mate, the more that other males will come to find her as an attractive mate as well. I found it interesting how well this concept relates to other ideas we have studied during this semester.

Messages to Taiwan

In the upcoming weeks, it will be very interesting to see how many of our class's e-mail chains make it all the way to the target person in Taiwan, and how many nodes the e-mail must go through to make it all the way there. This experiment once again shows the strength of weak ties. Most likely, you know most of the people your closest friends and family know. I know I went through all of my friends and family in my head and could easily think of the types of people they would know, and if any of these people would be advantageous in getting this e-mail across the world. It seems like it's definitely the weaker ties that will help this endeavor succeed, as they probably have more far-reaching contacts to which they can forward our e-mail.

With my e-mail list, I immediately thought of my cousin that has lived in Japan for the past 10 years, because I figured that would get the e-mail geographically closer to the target, and I know that my cousin has lots of acquaintances in Japan from all over Asia. However, I was then faced with the dilemma of whether to send this e-mail to other people in my extended family on my mom's side, because if they were to receive the opposite copy of the e-mail as my cousin and not see that he also received one, they would probably have the same mindset as myself and forward it on to him. Of course the chains could still be completed in this scenario, but it adds additional nodes, and provides a little bit more of a headache for my cousin.

This experiment will also be interesting, because as a few other people have already mentioned in blog posts, e-mail's role in society is changing. Interestingly enough, it has become a more "formal" mean of communication, when compared to texting, Facebook, etc. In fact, I had to text a few of my closest friends from home (since I know the e-mail formula for Northeastern students) to ask them what their e-mail addresses are, since I never contact them in this way. It is possible that this will be a problem all through the network and nodes. If the 4th person in one of the chains can think of a good person to forward this e-mail too, but they don't know their e-mail address and don't feel particularly obligated to put in the effort of doing a little research to find it (since they're so far removed from the chain starter, and have no real ties to them), a chain could easily die.

It's In Our Nature

The recent "Connected" reading we had about our instincts to create social networks, and survival techniques made me think of many things. Christakis and Fowler mention that "free riders" are much more likely than helpful "cooperaters" to survive in a given situation. But, using the example from the tv show "Survivor", they also say that people tend to ignore their selfish tendencies when it comes to people within their social networks or groups.

This made me think of the classic prompt, which I believe was recently turned into a movie... If you could push a button that would kill someone somewhere in the world, but get you $1 million, would you? More people certainly consider this when they assume that they would be killing someone they don't know, which is definitely the more likely scenario when you compare how many people there are in the world and how many people you actually know. But when it is thought about more deeply, people often back off a little bit after considering what it would be like if someone they knew, or even themselves, were the ones killed by a random greedy person they don't know halfway across the world.

Not so much in the example above, but oftentimes the reason why people are less selfish within their networks is because there are deep feelings involved, or like in the Survivor example, you may need the other person's help in the future because they will be in your life in the future. Many of us may consider pushing a button for $1 million and killing a random person, but probably just as many people would not even consider pushing a button for $1 million if it would even just injure someone we are close to.

What Happens When God Is A Node?

There was one topic covered in the Christakis and Fowler reading this week that we did not discuss in class but which I found highly fascinating. It was the idea that religion and the inclination to form networks may be related. Christakis and Fowler’s claim was that in a religious network, God is a node to whom all in the network are connected. This node can never be removed so there is always a short path between each and every member of that religious network. Their conclusion was that a key function of religion is to stabilize social connections.

I recently had a conversation with a friend in which we discussed much the same topic. We were talking about the purpose of Bible study groups in a particular nondenominational Protestant church. I had been under the impression that such groups were formed for the church’s members to better learn the religious text and to reinforce its moral teachings. My friend replied that yes, those were important aspects of the gathering, but that they were goals that could be achieved through individual study. She pointed out that in her religious upbringing she had been taught that the purpose of Bible study groups was to network with and create ties with individuals with the same believe system.

Christakis and Fowler, as well as my friend, realized that in many instances, religion is a social connector and stabilizer. To summarize Christakis and Fowler, religion binds people not just by a common idea, but also by a social relationship to other believers.

Clubs, Pubs, and Restaurants

Part of the experiment that Skylar (sp?) talked about in class was the importance of movement as essentially body language that can be read by humans across age, race, and culture. The experiment involved taping a bunch of speed dates, and then putting them together so that a viewer can see clips of the footage with or without sound. To isolate movement, the footage of the speed dates was blurred, so that facial expression were not coming into play. That being said, the size of the person, a little information about clothing, and their movements were still present. Even with the blurring, the experiment got pretty consistent results with running the same footage un-blurred. This phenomena got me thinking about how many places dim lights to create "ambiance" in places that dates/ relationships typically happen such as in restaurants, dance clubs, concerts, etc, since that is another way to slightly impair the ability of people to see details.

In these sorts of locations, it is harder due to the lighting to actually see people's faces, so one must necessarily rely more on body movements of any potential targets and on mate copying in order to access the different people there. One does not need lots of light on a dance floor or in a bar to quickly see who the "successful" people are– the people that other people are interacting with/ vying for most. In this way the theory holds up, however, the dim lighting also might make it so that people make choices that they wouldn't have made if they had full visibility, especially since alcohol is usually also linked to these sorts of places. The added complication of drinking adds another barrier to normal judgment, and makes body language that much more important in deriving meaning.

Will My Message Make It to Taiwan?

As part of the experiment that Daryl wrote about earlier, each member of the class is emailing ten people they know in hopes that the message will make it to the CEO of a nonprofit in Taiwan. The hope is that we mirror Stanley Milgram’s “Small Worlds” experiment that involved delivering an envelope from Nebraska to a business man in Boston. Just like Milgram’s experiment, we cannot simply look up the person in the phone book or Google and get in touch with them. The message needs to be delivered by someone who already knows the target. Thus we must pass the message along to someone we feel is one “step” closer to the destination.

                But there is a big difference between a message crossing half of the United States and one crossing half of the globe. There are literally oceans separating us from our target. However, unlike Milgram, we have the power of the internet and email. This probably makes getting the message there a lot easier than if we were to mail it in an envelope. With the internet, geography doesn’t really play a large role.

                However, geography should probably still play a role in our social networks. For most of us, we are a lot more likely to be connected to someone in the U.S. than we are to someone in Taiwan. The messages in Milgram’s experiment that made it to their destination did it on average in about 5 or 6 steps.  Can we assume that there is really a path to this person in Taiwan that is only 5 or 6 degrees away? I believe that the increased globalization that has taken place since Milgram’s era probably negates this difference in distance. We are more connected with people across the globe than ever before through business, education, and even something like video games or social networking sites. But the ease of email may also work against us. Depending on who it is from, it’s a lot easier to have an email go unnoticed than an envelope with your name on it.

                The final issue that leaves me doubting this experiments success is that Milgram wasn’t really that successful with his experiment. Of the 296 letters that were mailed to start, only 64 reached the destination. With a failure rate over 70%, can I really expect any success?

Actually, with all this in mind, I’m guessing that we get the same kind of success. It seems like all the advantages and disadvantages in comparison with Milgram’s experiment cancel each other out.

The Flaws of Email

The assignment studying the six degrees of separation theory is revealing more than just a test of how many steps it will take the email to arrive in the right hands. It has been about a week since I sent out ten emails. Five of my ten recipients have sent it on to another person. Of those five recipients, two have sent them on to another person. This means five of my ten letters are still on step 1, three of my ten are on step two, and two of my ten are on step three.

It takes, at most, thirty seconds to think of one person and forward an email to them. With such minimal effort required, why am I getting such a low turnout on these emails? One reason could be that in this day in age, peoples’ email inboxes get overwhelmingly cluttered with junk. In fact, I spent a good amount of time trying to think of the best thing to put in the subject line, so that it would have the best chance of getting forwarded on. I finally decided on “Northeastern University Six Degrees of Separation.” I was going to say “Six Degrees of Separation Study,” but I thought that some people might look at the subject line and immediately think it is some sort of spam. I was going to say “Please forward this on,” but that too could easily be marked as spam when skimming your inbox. A realization that I made after the fact, is that the five people who have not forwarded on my email are people whom I emailed for the first time ever. With Facebook messaging and texting, I never find it necessary to write emails to friends. I can imagine that these people may not know who dtbar1@gmail.com (my email) is, and saw the words “Northeastern University” in the subject line, and considered it some sort of advertisement or spam without reading the contents.

This problem can occur all of the time with this mode of communication. For example, I get emails from the Honors program all of the time about certain events, fundraisers, and community opportunities. I have been deleting and disregarding these emails for years now. A few weeks ago, I received an email from them saying that I needed to have a senior clearance meeting in order to make sure I was all set to graduate with honors. The problem is that the subject line started with the same “NU Honors Program,” and I deleted it. Luckily, I was able to find out through a friend about this requirement, but it is still an interesting example of how email might make it difficult to get a message along.

Proving Mate Copying

Research by Skylar Place, Peter Todd, Lars Penke, and Jens Asendorpf finds that humans show mate copying when selecting their mates. This means a human is more likely to be attracted to a mate that they perceive is gaining the interest of another person. In terms of dating, this means I would be more interested in a woman if I perceived that another man was also interested in her.

When one first thinks of the reason this may occur, several possibilities come to mind. We may subconsciously seek the approval of others in our mate choices. We may perceive another's interest in our "target" (what we'll call our potential mate of interest) as some kind of signal that they are suitable. It may be a subconscious effort to save the time required to find out more about that person. Possibly this mate copying is a result of some competitive instinct.

The research of Skylar Place, et al, does not give us a definite answer to that question. However, by studying subjects' reactions to recordings of speed dating, they seemed to have eliminated the competitive instinct theory. In effect, doing the study this way removed a lot of outside factors that may have been encountered in "the wild," or a bar or party. By studying the subjects individually the existence of peer influence is basically impossible. The people being studied were making decisions on their own and not even in the same room, or at the same time, as the daters they were watching.

Results showed that a subject's rating of how interested they were in a target increased if they believed that the target's date was interested in them. This was clear proof that mate copying exists among humans. At first glance these results may not seem that obvious because we have so much else in mind when we think about what we're attracted to. But the way this study was done eliminated a lot of those factors and shows that our perception of another's interest in a target significantly impacts our level of interest in them.