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The Importance of Weak Ties

In class we have discussed the notions of “strong” and “weak” ties which can connect the nodes of a network. In applying this to a social network, we’ve said that a strong tie can be described as a closer relationship between two people while a weak tie can be described as a weaker relationship. In general, many people seem to place far more intrinsic value stronger ties, since naturally it is easier to maintain a reciprocal relationship with someone you’re closer with and share more in common with.

However, people tend to underestimate the importance of weaker ties. Strong ties are valuable in that they tie together closely knit groups that share specific things in common, while weak ties are valuable in that they can tie together these closely knit groups. Weak ties serve as a bridge between groups of people that are closely knit with each other, but not with the other groups. Through these bridges, information can be fed from one group to another. In practice, this can be important in a number of ways. One major example of how weak links are important in the modern world is in the job seeking process. According to a survey conducted by Mark Granovetter on a random sample of people who had recently changed jobs in a certain Boston suburb, around 83.3% of the participants had found the job through contacts they saw either rarely or occasionally. This indicates that weak links are crucial in the job searching process – Granovetter says that this indicates the “primacy of structure over motivation”.

https://sociology.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/publications/the_strength_of_weak_ties_and_exch_w-gans.pdf

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