Weblog (9); Being a Social Butterfly Can Be A Good Thing

Being a Social Butterfly Can Be A Good Thing

The term “social butterfly” was mentioned during Network Society class on 22 September 2010. Like real butterflies, social butterflies tend to move from one group to another. The term suggests that those individuals maintain many weak ties. They engage in ‘superficial’ relationships and surround themselves with a diverse group of people.

As Granovetter (1973) and Rogers (2003) stated social butterflies are the force behind the diffusion of influence, innovation, and data. They are the innovators and early adopters that affect the decision-making process of whether or not a new product will flourish or flounder; this is paramount for the diffusion of innovations. Besides being the source, they are the primary resource for distributing the message to others in the flow of communication. They potentially act as change agents in the social system (Rogers, 1995).

Other elements such as time, intensity, attractiveness, and reciprocity can provide us further insights on the force of those social butterflies (Granovetter, 1973). What the impact of their behavior is on the network.

For the diffusion of innovations one needs the help of weak ties (social butterflies) to bridge the gap between adjacent clusters for the diffusion of innovation. Watts calls them the vulnerable nodes (Watts, 2001, Watts, 2003). They have a low threshold. Thus, they are the first one to change (Rogers, 1995). They are the carriers of information and strive in a network that is neither too loosely nor strongly connected. Rogers (2003) stated that weak ties show a low in communication proximity – they connect two nodes that do not share networks links with a common set of other nodes. And they are heterophilous, which is excellent for the diffusion of an innovation too.

Moreover, if we aim to design a new product, collect new thoughts or disseminate information, it is better not to focus on the strong ties, but rather on the ‘superficial’ social butterfly. Greater outcome will yield if we take the importance of those into consideration.


References:

Granovetter, M.S 1973. The Strength of Weak Ties. American Journal of Sociology, Volume 78 (6), 1360-1380

Rogers, E. 1995, Diffusion of Innovations. New York: The Free Press (Simon & Schuster Inc).

Rogers, E. M. 2003. Diffusion Networks. In: CROSS, R., PARKER, A. & SASSON, L. (ed.) Networks in the knowledge economy. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.

Watts, D. J. 2001. A simple model of global cascades on random networks. PNAS, 99, 5766-5771.

Watts, D. J. 2003. Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age, London, Vintage Books.