Fun with Psychology, Sociology + Social Media
Jan 16, 2015
Fun with Psychology, Sociology
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Social Media
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We are strange
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But often in the same ways
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Social Media Has More Payoffs Than We Think
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Luck = Outgoing = Connections
http://www.theluckfactor.com/make-your-luck/build-a-network.asp
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Benefits Translate Into the Real World
http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1398/internet-mobile-phones-impact-american-social-networks
Sharing the Special
7Photo: “Sharing” by: ryancr on Flickr
“If I’ve just read this story that changes the way I understand the world and myself, I want to talk to others about what it means. I want to proselytize and share the feeling of awe. If you read the article and feel the same emotion, it will bring us closer together.”
- Jonah Berger, Assistant Professor of Marketing, Wharton - http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/09/science/09tier.html 8
9http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GjTaV01eOeM
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Awe makes you feel - and we all want to feel
Psychology shows us how we make mistakes...
11Photo: “Hypnotised pumpkin” by minipixel on Flickr
Problem:
The Curse of Knowledge
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We are greatly limited by what we know.
It corrupts how we convey things to others
And our perception of how others see things.
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Problem:
Distinguishing Source
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http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pedobear15
http://pedobearpics.com/
Illustration by Angela Merickhttp://mbarrick.livejournal.com/894999.html
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http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pedobear18
Pedobear added by artist Michael Barrickhttp://mbarrick.livejournal.com/894999.html
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[The Bad]
Metronews, Vancouver20
Problem:
Rumors
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Sure, death is easy to disprove. But what if the rumor isn’t as cut and dry.
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Steve cheats on his wife.
Carol’s an anti-Semite.
How do you disprove that?
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You can’t.
And it spreads.
And it doesn’t die.
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“Here we are, quadrillions of bytes deep into the Information Age. And yet information, it seems, has never mattered less.”
-Elizabeth Kolbert, “The Things People Say: Rumors in an age of unreason”, The New Yorker
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“[P]eople usually do not moderate their position after hearing an opposing opinion, but rather become more extreme about their original view.
And, as easy as it is to spread a rumor, it can be extremely difficult to squelch one. Attempts to correct a rumor often backfire and only cause people to believe it more deeply.”
-Elizabeth Kolbert, “The Things People Say: Rumors in an age of unreason”, The New Yorker (interpreting Cass Sunstein’s theories)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/09/AR2009100901717.html
Problem:
Lack of Context
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"To an increasing degree, your silly, confused, flirtatious, angry and offensive moments, on Facebook and in email or in daily life, are subject to being recorded and stored (forever) and, potentially, mischaracterized"
- Cass Sunstein36
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We don’t have full story in 54 seconds
We follow other people re: Popularity
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Problem:
39http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/12/st_clive_thompson
Myopia
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Problem:
“I interviewed gay men who thought Friendster was a gay dating site because all they saw were other gay men...I interviewed teens who believed that everyone on MySpace was Christian because all of the profiles they saw contained biblical quotes. We all live in our own worlds with people who share our values and, with networked media, it's often hard to see beyond that.”
- Danah Boyd, Social Media Researcher
We want it more if we think it’s scarce
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Problem:
Let’s pretend the supply here is limited
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I’m going to assume they have plenty of these
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Just an educated guess
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Insight
More
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“The widespread availability of world wide fora does not create new social or moral standards, it merely gives people the opportunity to spread their immoral ideas more effectively.Instead of convicting sites like Facebook, researchers on human traits should praise them for easily and freely externalising what goes about in society.
- Blogger, Fabrice Hofmanhttp://fanemka.blogspot.com/2010/02/sociology-and-social-media-two-case.html47
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Who knew there was such demand?
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We don’t always see what we think we do
Reference Articles, Experiments and Books
See
http://delicious.com/mhamburg/PsychSocialMedia
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Find Articles, Notes & Resources
You can find this presentation on:
http://www.slideshare.net/mhamburg
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Contact Me
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