We and others have done a bunch of work to show that if your real friends online say or do something, it affects you. But if your acquaintances online say or do something, it does not. People on average have… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
Whether we appreciate it or not, we live out our lives surrounded by an intricate pattern of social connections... We're all embedded in this network; it affects us profoundly and we may be unaware of its existence, of its effect… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
The reason we form networks is because the benefits of a connected life outweigh the costs. It's to our advantage as individuals and a… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
It's fashionable to speak about vulnerable populations in medicine and public policy, but it's harder to find a more vulnerable population than those who… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
“If we are connected to everyone else by six degrees and we can influence them up to three degrees, then one way to think… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
Social networks are these intricate things of beauty, and they're so elaborate and so complex and so ubiquitous that one has to ask what… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
We are, first of all, not solitary creatures and second of all, we are deeply embedded in the lives of others. It's very easy… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
I like to have met someone in real life before being their Facebook friend. — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
It's important for students to take their studies seriously. — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
My entire youth was spent with an incredibly ill parent... I don't think you can grow up that way and not be marked by… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
I'm not suggesting that social scientists stop teaching and investigating classic topics like monopoly power, racial profiling and health inequality. But everyone knows that… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
One reason citizens, politicians and university donors sometimes lack confidence in the social sciences is that social scientists too often miss the chance to… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
People have just assumed that... if we call our Facebook acquaintances our friends, we must be influenced by them, too. But we're not. — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share Image
We are, first of all, not solitary creatures and second of all, we are deeply embedded in the lives of others. It's very easy to forget that and to engage in an atomistic fallacy - where we think that all we have to do is study the individual components of a system in order to understand the system. That's clearly… — Nicholas A. Christakis Copy Share
