Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard University

Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age

Abstract:

We've all heard of the small world phenomenon--the idea that each one of us can be connected to everyone else through only "six degrees of separation". But where did this idea come from? Is it true? And if it is, what implications does it have for the problems of modern society? In this talk, I sketch out the scholarly history of the small world problem (alongside its meteoric rise in popular culture), from its origins in sociology to an explosion of recent work in physics and mathematics. I also discuss (very briefly) the importance of social networks to a range of phenomena, focusing on the effects of social influence on the dynamics of cultural markets. Understanding the social world, I argue, requires more than recognizing that we are all connected; we must also understand the patterns those connections and how they drive both individual and collective behavior.