Without saying a word, their steps already showed whether they hit it off
Among women meeting for the first time, a better first impression went with more synchronized walking. The same pattern did not appear among men.
Society and relationships
How we relate to others can be studied in conversations, groups and everyday situations. These readings explore particular questions about social life without turning one finding into a rule for everyone.
What to look for in these studies
Culture, setting and the way participants were selected can change how a result should be interpreted. An association does not identify a cause on its own. Look at who took part and what kind of interaction researchers compared.
- Who took part, and in what setting?
- Was behavior observed or reported by participants?
- What interaction or situation was compared?
Explore the research
Remembering who helped you brought warmth and a wish to give back
People who wrote about someone who helped them felt more moved and connected, and also more indebted. Guilt was less consistent.
Students chose to view more scenes of harm between people
Interpersonal harm attracted more choices than neutral scenes in three experiments using image pairs. Isolated injuries and dangerous animals did not.
Grading peers and being graded raised scores slightly
In a statistics course, each student tried both approaches in randomized order; the final advantage was two or three percentage points.
Where resources were more unequal, the shared fund received less
In a laboratory game, the average contribution was nine units under less inequality and five under more. Outsiders preferred proportional contributions.
Before graduating, men already expected to earn more than women
Among 865 students in Switzerland, men expected salaries nearly 10% higher at graduation. These were expectations, not wages received.
A memory exercise increased a sales offer, but not a salary offer
Business students who recalled when being a woman and a professional went together made higher offers in a hypothetical sale, but not in a salary negotiation.
Similar applications with another name received a different response
Before May 2020, names perceived as White received more responses. In the following six weeks, the pattern reversed, with weak evidence.
Sharing a desk for one semester made friendship more likely
With randomly assigned seats in rural Hungarian schools, mutual friendship rose from just over 15% to just over 22%.
Showing that you helped others brought more yeses to hosting requests
Study-created profiles with references describing help received more immediate yeses on an online hospitality network. Neutral praise drew fewer acceptances.
An invitation from a neighbor did not change how many people came to clean
Most people who answered the phone in three Tunis neighborhoods said they would attend, but about 3% of recruited households showed up.
Women spent more time on housework at every age
Time-use diaries from ten industrialized countries. In Italy, women spent 226 minutes a day and men 50; in Finland, the figures were 163 and 110.
A rental inquiry with an Arabic male name received fewer replies
The estimated response probability was 16% with an Arabic male name and 42% with a Finnish female name, across 800 listings in Finland.
In Boston, the hottest areas were not the most vulnerable
The tool combines temperature, vulnerability, and space for trees. In Boston, one map was not enough.
When deprivation was added, diversity was less consistently linked to lower cohesion
In Great Britain, after accounting for each area's material disadvantage, most negative associations weakened or disappeared.
Lower-income people had fewer high-income friends than expected
On Facebook, about half of that gap was associated with less exposure to one another. The other half was associated with fewer friendships forming when they did meet.
Each account's politics was more closely linked to what it shared than to the source
On U.S. Twitter, accounts' estimated political orientation aligned more with what they shared than with the reliability of the sites.
Average trust did not change with social assistance in Kenya
Among informal-economy households, there was no average change. In counties with restrictions, some estimates pointed to greater trust.
People who talked more with others reported less psychological distress
Across 40 disadvantaged London neighborhoods, more personal contact was associated with fewer symptoms, while civic participation was associated with more.
When groups mixed, shared cooperation was rewarded more
In a game with 366 people, cooperation across groups rose when cross-group meetings were assigned or chosen, although most people chose their own group.
Older adults had more social support in areas with community initiatives
Social support was higher in areas with initiatives. Models also associated both initiative categories with greater mental well-being.
Among refugees in Germany, each kind of support had its own network
Almost half of those providing practical help were new contacts. Emotional support came mainly from family.
Trust in institutions went along with feeling safer
In surveys from Italy and 16 European countries, it also went along with greater trust in strangers. An experiment found no direct change.
In German classrooms, refugees were named as friends less often
They also faced more rejections as desk partners: 31% versus 21%. Rejection was lower in more diverse classrooms.
Receiving financial support from their children went along with less work
They reported what they had done the previous day and what financial and caregiving support they gave to or received from their children. The team then looked for patterns.
Counties with greater community trust recorded fewer infections
Across more than 2,700 US counties, they also recorded fewer deaths. Institutional trust showed no such link with infections.
Greater exposure to false messages, but similar willingness to share them
With more connections among like-minded people in artificial networks, over 70% saw congenial false messages. In integrated networks, just over 35% did.
In a disaster, neighbors combined memory, relationships, and technical knowledge
Close ties provided practical and emotional help, while outside contacts expanded available resources, according to three Colombian communities.
People who connected different groups were more involved with politicians
This pattern appeared among members of associations in a French town of about 2,000 residents. Among politicians, the standout factor was how much they participated.
Older adults said a lack of transport could mean missing social gatherings
Shops, streets, and meaningful roles created opportunities to meet, according to accounts from 15 Australians aged 60 or older.
Valuing inclusion was more closely linked to colleagues than to training
Among 2,043 employees who had already received training, leaders’ support was also associated with believing that one’s own actions can make a difference.
Nearly 80% saw libraries as potential places to meet
Among 605 complete responses to an open survey in England, lack of funding was the most frequently cited barrier.