Open AccessEmpirical social triad statistics can be explained with dyadic homophylic interactions
Author(s) -
Tuan Minh Pham,
Jan Korbel,
Rudolf Hanel,
Stefan Thurner
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
proceedings of the national academy of sciences of the united states of america
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.011
H-Index - 771
eISSN - 1091-6490
pISSN - 0027-8424
DOI - 10.1073/pnas.2121103119
Subject(s) - friendship , robustness (evolution) , computer science , cohesion (chemistry) , social relation , relation (database) , social psychology , theoretical computer science , psychology , data mining , physics , biochemistry , chemistry , quantum mechanics , gene
Significance Social stability is often associated with triangular interactions between people. Various possible social triangles appear in peculiar ratios. The triangles “The friend of my friend is my friend” and “The enemy of my friend is my enemy” are strongly overrepresented, which plays an important role for social balance. A standard explanation for these characteristic triangle fractions is that people consider triadic information before forming social relations. This assumption often contradicts everyday experience. We propose an explanation of the observed overrepresentations without individuals having to consider triangles. A society where individuals minimize their social stress self-organizes toward the empirically observed triangular structures. We demonstrate this with data from a society of computer game players, where triangle formation can be directly observed.