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How hyenas make new friends

http://www.futurity.org/hyenas-social-networks-922882/

For some people, making new friends is the easiest thing in the world. For other, more socially awkward people, it seems like the hardest thing in life. It makes sense to state that it’s easier to get to know someone if you have common friends. But is this a human trait, or rather a property of all networks?

The linked article discusses how social networks form in clans of hyenas and found remarkable similarities with the human behavior, both in real life and on social media. The study, which was published in Ecology Letters, observed the animals in Kenya for a period of 20 years, which makes it one of the largest scale non-human social dynamics study to date.

The researchers found that hyenas are most likely to become friends with their friends’ friends, a network principle called ‘triadic closure’. While other traits, such as social status and outside factors, also mattered in the process of making friends, it was triadic closure which was the key determinant of relationships. Remarkably, the study also found that male hyenas seemed to follow this social rule more than females. It is interesting how we can apply the same rules to social networks in humans as in hyenas, it suggests that triatic closure it a universal and powerful rule.

This article relates to class as triadic closure is a principle which we discussed. This study re-confirms its validity and universality,  as social networks in humans and hyenas follow it.

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