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2009
2008

In The Blogs

Social Happiness

— By Kevin Drum | Tue December 9, 2008 9:50 AM PST

SOCIAL HAPPINESS....Remember all those news reports from last week hawking a study about how happiness is spread via social networks? Via Justin Wolfers, a couple of spoilsports have done a competing study that looked at a few other characteristics. From their writeup:

As we intended to investigate potential biases in previous methods, we looked at three health outcomes that could not credibly be subject to social network effects and were available in all three waves of the data: self reports of skin problems, self reports of headaches, and height over time.

Long story short, they found network effects for all three of these things even though network effects almost certainly don't exist. The problem, they say, is that shared environments (same school, similar eating habits, etc.) can explain much of the supposed "contagion," but the datasets used for social network studies often don't include enough information on individual environments to allow it to be factored out.

In other words, be careful accepting breathless claims about the spread of this or that via social networks. Maybe it's true, maybe it isn't. On the other hand, it can't hurt to have happy friends, can it?

23 Comments | Post Comment

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Submitted by Luther (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 1:59pm.

An exception to spreading happiness:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megan_Meier

Megan Taylor Meier[1][2] (November 6, 1992 ? October 17, 2006) was an American teenager from Dardenne Prairie, Missouri who committed suicide in October 2006.[3] Her suicide was attributed to cyber-bullying through the social networking website MySpace

Submitted by DCreader (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 10:19am.

It's not just common environments, it's also selection. Tall (short) kids are more likely to be friends with other tall (short) kids. Similarly, kids without acne may be more likely to be friends with other acne-free kids. Thus individual characteristics --> social network structure, rather than vice versa. This is just a new version of that old observation that "correlation is not causation."

Submitted by thersites (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 10:20am.

BREAKING NEWS
If you have a lot of friends, and a lot of them are happy, there's a good chance you, too, are happy.

Next up: if most of your neighbors live in expensive homes, you probably do, too. Is affluence contagious?

Submitted by JD (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 10:28am.

The height one is definitive, and I agree with their overall conclusion. On the other hand, it is possible that headaches, and possibly skin complaints, are "contagious." I've certainly seen one head-ache complainer spread to others around her, so that many people start noticing low-level aches that might otherwise have been ignored.

Submitted by SecularAnimist (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 10:33am.

Does happiness spread via social networking?

Two words:

Friday catblogging.

Submitted by kenga (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 10:59am.

On the other hand, it can't hurt to have happy friends, can it?
If your friends still think the old "thumbtack on the chair" gag is high comedy, yes.

Submitted by Luther (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 1:59pm.

An exception to spreading happiness:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megan_Meier

Megan Taylor Meier[1][2] (November 6, 1992 October 17, 2006) was an American teenager from Dardenne Prairie, Missouri who committed suicide in October 2006.[3] Her suicide was attributed to cyber-bullying through the social networking website MySpace

Submitted by thersites (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 2:14pm.

Actually, I never socially network without Trojans. I've never caught a case of happiness and, Gnarled Oak Deity willing, never will.

Submitted by Rick B (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 2:44pm.

it can't hurt to have happy friends, can it?

How would you know, Kevin? You're a political blogger, after all. Except for your cats, where would you find happy friends?

Submitted by tpx (not verified) on December 9, 2008 - 3:11pm.

Can guilt be spread via social networks? Spoilsports would point out Americans preoccupation for being happy all the time, in all circumstances, allows them to ignore reality and be exploited. Call it the Moderate Absorption. This exploitation has led to wars and economic failure, yet Americans insist they must be happy despite all of the misery their happiness creates. Americans must require new social networks to prevent their happiness from bombing villages and to prevent the rich from seizing most of the economy's wealth.

You're a moron if you think

Submitted by tiffany jewelry (not verified) on August 15, 2009 - 12:47am.

You're a moron if you think Anon is actually a group of people, or at the very least, the same group of people at any given time. Someone did this and claimed to do it in Anon's name, that is all.