Thank you Tony and Dorian for this contribution. I enjoyed
contemplating what was written, running each point by my truth
meter. One of my reflections is that some decades ago, Harrison was
talking about the power of edgewalkers in bringing about
transformation. This much earlier observation by Harrison sums up
some of the points made.
I now have a question. I am looking at the point made
"Therefore, *a key strategy for spreading new norms and behaviours
in networks is to foster tightly-knit groups of adopters in a
local, peripheral setting,* who will mutually reinforce each
others’ choices as they cultivate social change."
My question: does anyone have experience in which the above is
true? I am thinking about the spread of OST, Appreciative Inquiry,
Genuine Contact etc, all social change technologies. I believe it
to be true that they, and other social technologies, didn't grow
locally from tightly knit groups of adopters...they each gathered
people from a number of countries, even if just one or two per
country, and strengthened the concepts from there. They were helped
along by good publications.
Thoughts?
in genuine contact,
Birgitt
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On Sun, Apr 16, 2023 at 2:18 AM Tony Budak via OSList
<[email protected]> wrote:
*
Summaries on Complex Contagions & Behavior Change*
There are two books by Damon Centola
(https://www.damoncentola.com/), both of which Tom Woodroof
have written summaries of:
•
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ZOK6Hv9i1sM7uPd8Xjk6qbJySapPRnimnErL-0cKl4w/edit#
•
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1--NlCdnbYu7I1F0Img5iE1afXdnsqo903zf3jnfCkOY/edit#heading=h.qve2gb7t94qm
[dorian] dorian
<https://community.deepadaptation.info/u/dorian> Community Weaver
April 14
Sorry I wasn’t able to join your event, @tonyb
<https://community.deepadaptation.info/u/tonyb>. But thanks a
lot for sharing these summaries :raised_hands:
Here are the key takeaways I’m drawing from these two docs:
*
*Tightly-knit, clustered social groups (such as groups of
mutual friends) fostering strong relational ties are key to
the spread of new norms and complex behaviours.*
Conversely, weak ties connecting huge numbers of
less-familiar people across a network are mostly useful to
spread information, memes, or viruses (via simple
contagion) - but not the adoption of new norms, behaviours
or practices that entail some element of risk. Overcoming
this risk requires constant affirmation, ongoing
maintenance, and reinforcement from multiple points of
contact around oneself who are undertaking the same changes
- otherwise it’s easy to grow discouraged and abandon the
change. *Creating a sense of social confirmation is
critical to the spread of “complex contagions”.*
*
*For a contagion to spread from one clustered group to
another, “wide bridges” (multiple interpersonal ties
between people in different groups, neighbourhoods, etc.)
are essential.* “Narrow bridges” (connecting just one
broker from one group with another broker from another
group) are not enough. In fact, brokers’ privileged
structural position can actually hinder the spread of
innovative practises.
*
So i*t is much more efficient to cultivate social
incubators of innovation locally, than to try relying on
central influencers to spread complex changes in behaviour.*
*
*Participants who start off most resistant to embracing a
complex change often become the most committed to this
change once they do embrace it:* the same factors that make
a behaviour complex also make it “sticky.”
*
*The more connected people are, the less likely they are to
adopt a new idea of behaviour* - because humans tend to
assess ideas/behaviours in terms of the fraction of people
in our network who have already adopted it (not by the
absolute number). So if I’m connected to thousands of
people, and only a small percentage of them have embraced
this idea, it has very little legitimacy for me: the
non-adopters act as countervailing influences on me.
*
So *it is much more likely that someone at the periphery of
a network, with a more modest number of connections, will
embrace a complex change:* their adoption threshold will be
lower. It is therefore possible for an innovation to take
hold, gain momentum, and spread through the periphery until
it becomes impossible to ignore, even for people at the
network’s centre. *Across a variety of contexts, the
network periphery is needed to spark and support meaningful
social change.*
*
Therefore, *a key strategy for spreading new norms and
behaviours in networks is to foster tightly-knit groups of
adopters in a local, peripheral setting,* who will mutually
reinforce each others’ choices as they cultivate social
change. Then, wide bridges with other tightly-knit groups
should be built for these social innovations (or social
movements, like the #BLM example) to spread more widely.
*
For innovations that require more social proof that
something will be useful, or else emotional excitement,
loyalty, or solidarity, then *similarity* among reinforcing
contacts is key. But for change that requires legitimacy
(the sense that sth is widely accepted), then *diversity*
among adopters is critical: otherwise it will look like the
innovation only concerns a particular clique/type/social class.
*
*When the proportion of activists committed to overturning
a particular norm in a network exceeds 25% of the
population, they succeed every time*. A social tipping
point then occurs.
*
*Teams of diverse, complementary people who function in
clusters that do not exchange information so freely among
themselves, are much more innovative than teams in which
everyone is connected to everyone else:* this leads to
everyone looking at the problem in the same way by focusing
on “easy/obvious” solutions.
*
*Overly centralised networks tend to allow the people at
the centre to spread their biases (as
memes/viruses/information) across entire populations*. In
contrast, challenging ideas, as complex contagions,
typically emerge at the egalitarian, moderately-connected
network periphery**, away from the overwhelming
countervailing influences faced by those at the centre.
*Influencers can spread simple contagions, but not complex
ones.*
*
*Egalitarian network structures for exchanging opinions can
have incredibly powerful effects in helping people overcome
their biases.* This is all the more noticeable when voices
are brought in from the network periphery.
This provides food for thought and confirmation in terms of
what I think many of us have been doing in DAF… :thinking:
For example:
* fostering small crews, communities of practice, and local
community groups appears essential to cultivating social
innovation and nurturing the spread of a “DA mindset”.
Conversely, if one is left on their own, it is easy to grow
discouraged by all the people around who are /not/
embracing this change;
* if innovations are to travel from DAF into other places,
network-weaving between our networks/community and others
should not be left to just one or two people, but should
involve multiple people creating mutually reinforcing
relationships;
* having a less centralised network structure in DAF also
appears essential to foster social learning and creativity
across various clusters doing their thing.
Lots more to explore I’m sure. Any comments/feedback welcome
:slight_smile:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Visit Topic
<https://community.deepadaptation.info/t/damon-centola-two-book-summaries-on-behavior-change/1601/3>
to respond.
@dorian <https://community.deepadaptation.info/u/dorian> Your
rigorous summary of Centola’s work is exactly what we need to
improve our community practices and develop a better
understanding of the concepts Centola presents. I’m so grateful
for your work, sharing your time, and talent. Thanks again and
again.
More Fun and Less Stuff,
Until next time, Tony Budak,
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