Progress Daily

Since 1948 three generations of residents in Framingham have participated in regular medical examinations. A new study (”Alone in the crowd: The structure and spread of loneliness in a large social network”; .pdf file here) by John Cacioppo that uses Framingham to analyse loneliness has found that it spreads very much like a communicable disease.

Participants in the study were routinely asked to list people who would probably know their whereabouts in the next 2 to 4 years, & were asked to describe their relationship with each person as friend, spouse, sibling, neighbour or colleague. Between 1983 and 2001 participants were regularly asked to state how many days a week they felt certain feelings, such as loneliness.

Analyzing this data, the researchers found that loneliness formed in clusters of people, and that once one person in a social network started expressing feelings of loneliness, others within the same network would start to feel the same way. Those who had immediate contact with lonely people were around 50% more likely than average to feel lonely themselves. In people who knew people who had direct contact with lonely people, the figure was 25%. Those with three degrees of separation showed roughly a 10% increase.

The effects were more noticeable among friends than family, and stronger among women than men.

“Alone in the crowd,” The Economist

Two years ago, a study by Carsten Wrosch (”You’ve Gotta Know When to Fold ‘Em: Goal Disengagement and Systemic Inflammation in Adolescence“) demonstrated the importance of giving up inappropriate goals — those teenagers who were better at doing so had a lower concentration of C-reactive protein, a substance (made in response to inflammation and) associated with an elevated risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

A recent study by Dr Wrosch and Gregory Miller (”Depressive symptoms can be useful: Self-regulatory and emotional benefits of dysphoric mood in adolescence“) measured the “goal adjustment capacities” of 97 girls aged 15-19 over the course of 19 months. They asked the participants questions about their ability to disengage from unattainable goals and to re-engage with new goals.They also asked about a range of symptoms associated with depression, and tracked how these changed over the course of the study.

Those who experienced mild depressive symptoms could disengage more easily from unreachable goals. They also proved less likely to suffer more serious depression in the long run.

The prevalence of inappropriately optimistic persistence may help explain why the US has the highest depression rate in the world.

“Mild and bitter,” The Economist

A series of a series of experiments (”Positive Self-Statements: Power for Some, Peril for Others“) by Joanne Wood suggest that positive self-statements cause negative moods in people with low self-esteem. The researchers questioned a group of 68 men and women using long-accepted methods to measure self-esteem. The participants were then asked to write down their thoughts & feelings. In the midst of this, half were randomly assigned to say to themselves “I am a lovable person” every time they heard a bell ring.

Immediately after the exercise, they were asked questions such as “What is the probability that a 30-year-old will be involved in a happy, loving romance?” to measure individual moods using a scoring system that ranged from a low of zero to a high of 35.

Those with high self-esteem who repeated “I’m a lovable person” scored an average of 31 on their mood assessment compared with an average of 25 by those who did not repeat the phrase. Among participants with low self-esteem, those making the statement scored an average of 10 while those that did not managed an average of 17.

“Words of wisdom,” The Economist

A 10-year Australian study (”Effect of social networks on 10 year survival in very old Australians“) found that older people with a large circle of friends were 22% less likely to die during the study period than those with fewer friends.

A large 2007 study (”The Spread of Obesity in a Large Social Network over 32 Years“) showed an increase of nearly 60% in the risk for obesity among people whose friends gained weight.

In 2008, Harvard researchers reported that strong social ties could promote brain health as we age (”Effects of Social Integration on Preserving Memory Function in a Nationally Representative US Elderly Population“). Over a 6-year period, memory among the least integrated declined at twice the rate as among the most integrated.

In 2006, a study (”Social Networks, Social Support, and Survival After Breast Cancer Diagnosis“) of nearly 3,000 nurses with breast cancer found that women without close friends were four times as likely to die from the disease as women with 10 or more friends. Proximity and the amount of contact with a friend wasn’t associated with survival, nor was having a spouse.

In 2008, researchers studied 34 college students (”Social support and the perception of geographical slant“), taking them to the base of a steep hill and fitting them with a weighted backpack. They were then asked to estimate the steepness of the hill. Some participants stood next to friends during the exercise, while others were alone. The students who stood with friends gave lower estimates of the steepness of the hill. And the longer the friends had known each other, the less steep the hill appeared.

“What Are Friends For? A Longer Life,” by Tara Parker-Pope

Based on the 2007 Pew Global Attitudes survey, the attitudes of people in emerging nations whose household income can be considered at least “middle income” by international standards (more than $4,300-per-year in standardized international dollars) differs from those of poorer citizens.

Middle class respondents are more likely to say it is very important to live in a country with key institutional features of democracy, such as fair multiparty elections and a fair judiciary, are more likely to emphasize the importance of the rights enshrined in the First Amendment (free speech, a free press, and freedom of religion).

When asked to choose which is most important to them personally — free speech, freedom of religion, freedom from hunger and poverty, or freedom from crime and violence — they are more likely to prioritize being able to speak freely in public (lower-income respondents were more likely to emphasize being free from hunger and poverty).

People in the global middle class are less likely to consider religion central to their lives, and less likely to believe faith is essential for morality. (See “Unfavorable Views of Jews and Muslims on the Increase in Europe” and “World Publics Welcome Global Trade - But Not Immigration.”)

Similar differences characterize views about homosexuality, especially in Eastern Europe.

Middle-class respondents are more likely to consider global warming a very serious problem; and they are more likely to say that pollution is a very big problem for their country.

Life satisfaction tends to be higher in wealthy countries (see “A Rising Tide Lifts Mood in the Developing World“); and in developing countries, it tends to be higher among wealthy people.

Across the 13 nations, the median percentage rating their current life in the range of seven to 10 is 50% among the global middle class and just 31% among poorer respondents.

The median percentage of middle-class respondents saying their life five years ago rated at least a seven was 45%, compared with 33% of the less affluent.

The 13-country median percentage among the middle class saying their lives would rate a 7-10 in the future was 71%; in contrast, 58% of less wealthy respondents felt this way.

“The Global Middle Class,” Pew Global Attitudes Project

Nicholas A. Christakis & James H. Fowler studied about 4,700 people, followed from 1983 to 2003 as part of the Framingham Heart Study. (See “Dynamic spread of happiness in a large social network”; .pdf file here.) These subjects were embedded in a larger network of about 12,000 people; they had an average of 11 connections to others in the social network (including to friends, family, co-workers, and neighbors); and their happiness was assessed every few years using a standard measure.

The researchers found that social networks have clusters of happy and unhappy people within them that reach out to three degrees of separation. A person’s happiness is correlated with the happiness of their friends, their friends’ friends, and their friends’ friends’ friends. Happy people tended to be located in the center of their social networks and to be located in large clusters of other happy people. Each additional happy friend increased a person’s probability of being happy by about 9%. (For comparison, having an extra $5,000 in income — in 1984 dollars — is estimated to increase the probability of being happy by about 2%.)

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In an unpublished follow-up study, the researchers examined a group of about 1,700 college students on Facebook. They coded who appeared in photographs with whom. The average student had over 110 friends on Facebook, but they had an average of only six “picture friends” (i.e., people close enough that they tagged the student).

They then coded whether the students were smiling in their profile photographs, and mapped the network of students and their picture friends, making note of who was smiling and who was not.

The figure above is a map of part of this Facebook network in 2007. It contains about 350 students, each represented by a node; each line between two nodes indicates that the connected individuals were tagged in a photo together. Students who were smiling (and who were immediately surrounded by smiling people in their network) are colored yellow. Students who were frowning (and who are immediately surrounded by such serious looks) are colored blue. Shades of green indicate a mix of smiling and non-smiling friends.

The blue nodes and the yellow nodes strongly cluster together. Statistical analysis of the network shows that people who smile tend to have more friends (smiling is correlated with an average of one extra friend, which is significant, since the average person has only about 6 close friends). Those who smile are measurably more central to the network.

“Social Networks & Happiness“

According to the National Opinion Research Center’s General Social Surveys, 1972-2004, 44% of people who reported being “conservative” or “very conservative” said they were “very happy” versus only 25% of people who reported being “liberal” or “very liberal.” A 2007 Gallup poll found that 58% of Republicans versus only 38% of Democrats said that their mental heath is “excellent.”

Daniel Klein (”Survey Project: Policy Views of Academics“), using voter registrations, found that in all departments in all colleges and universities throughout the USA, Democrats outnumber Republicans by 8 to 1. Smith College political scientist Stanley Rothman, in a 2005 national study, found that only 15% professors describe themselves as conservative, compared to 72% who said they were liberal (80% in humanities and social sciences).

“The Conscience of the Conservative,” by Michael Shermer

According to research by Kerwin Kofi Charles, Erik Hurst and Nikolai Roussanov (”Conspicuous Consumption and Race“), conspicuous consumption serves less to establish the owner’s positive status as affluent than to fend off the negative perception that the owner is poor. The richer a society or peer group, the less important visible spending becomes.

An African American family with the same income, family size, and other demographics as a white family will spend about 25% more of its income on jewelry, cars, personal care, and apparel. For the average black family, making about $40,000 a year, that amounts to $1,900 more a year than for a comparable white family. To make up the difference, African Americans spend much less on education, health care, entertainment, and home furnishings. (The same is true of Latinos.)

The researchers hypothesized that visible consumption lets individuals show strangers they aren’t poor. Since strangers tend to lump people together by race, the lower your racial group’s income, the more valuable it is to demonstrate your personal buying power.

To test this idea, the researchers compared the spending patterns of people of the same race in different states — say, blacks in Alabama versus blacks in Massachusetts, or whites in South Carolina versus whites in California. They found that, all else being equal (including one’s own income), an individual spent more of his income on visible goods as his racial group’s income went down. In places where blacks in general have more money, individual black people feel less pressure to prove their wealth.

The same is true for whites. Controlling for differences in housing costs, an increase of $10,000 in the mean income for white households — about like going from South Carolina to California – leads to a 13% decrease in spending on visible goods.

This suggests why emerging economies like Russia and China, despite their low average incomes, are such hot luxury markets today.

Conspicuous consumption, then, is not a universal phenomenon. It’s a development phase that declines as countries, regions, or distinct groups get richer.

In The Middle-Class Millionaire, Russ Alan Prince and Lewis Schiff analyzed the spending habits of the 8.4 million American households whose wealth is self-made and whose net worth, including their home equity, is between $1 million and $10 million. Aside from a penchant for fancy cars, these millionaires devote their luxury dollars mostly to goods and services outsiders can’t see: concierge health care, home renovations, all sorts of personal coaches, and expensive family vacations.

“Inconspicuous Consumption,” by Virginia Postrel

Justin Wolfers and Betsey Stevenson analyzed all the major post-war happiness studies data (.pdf file here), including new data from the Gallup World Poll, which contains detailed data on subjective well-being for 132 countries in 2006. Contrary to previous researchers using less complete date, they found that: 1) Rich people are happier than poor people. 2) Richer countries are happier than poorer countries. 3) As countries get richer, they tend to get happier.

The following chart takes the average levels of satisfaction reported on the Gallup Poll’s 0-10 scale, and plots it against G.D.P. per capita (note the log scale):

The correlation between average levels of happiness and average incomes is very high — greater than 0.8.

The relationship between happiness and log income appears nearly linear. Thus, a 10% rise in income in a rich country like the USA appears to increase happiness by about as much as a 10% rise in income in Burundi — in fact, the slope appears to get steeper above $15K!

A 10% rise in income in Burundi requires one-sixtieth as much income as a 10% rise in income in the USA. Thus, even if the slope is three times as steep for rich countries as poor countries (as Wolfers & Stevenson estimate), this still means than an extra $100 has about a twenty-times-greater effect on happiness in Burundi.

“The Economics of Happiness, Part 1 & Part 2,” by Justin Wolfers

Robert J. Barro and Rachel M. McCleary (”Religion and Economic Growth Across Countries” & “Religion and Political Economy in an International Panel“) researched the relationship between religion and development.

Their cross-country analysis shows that per capita gdp has a significantly negative effect on religion, both in terms of beliefs and participation. This tendency is gradual as countries grow richer. A steady pattern of secularization has only applied to a few countries, such as Britain, France, and Germany.

For a given level of religious participation, increases in core religious beliefs — notably belief in hell, heaven, and an afterlife — tend to increase economic growth. In contrast, for given religious beliefs, increases in church attendance tend to reduce economic growth. In other words, the main growth effect is a positive response to an increase in believing relative to belonging (attending).

A certain amount of participation in religious activities is positive, in that people acquire useful beliefs. But if people spend too much time in religious activities, there is a negative effect on economic growth.

Religious participation is correlated with a lower probability of substance abuse, juvenile delinquency (Michael J. Donahue and Peter L. Benson, “Religion and the Well-Being of Adolescents“),  and depression (”Immigrant Generation, Assimilation and Adolescent Psychological Well-being“), and positive attitudes toward marriage and having children (Elaine Marchena and Linda J. Waite, “Re-assessing Family Goals and Attitudes in Late Adolescence”).

Overall, urbanization has a negative effect on religiosity, particularly in terms of participation.

“Religion and Economic Development,” by Rachel M. McCleary