We are surrounded by webs of people (figure 5.2). Look no further than your smart device. If you look at your contact list and your friends or followers on social media, you can get a sense of who you share some connection with. Yet, even though we can now easily keep contact with distant family members and friends from grade school, Americans are increasingly socially isolated (Parigi and Henson II 2014). The pandemic may have exacerbated this trend in a variety of arenas. In this section we will explore the basics of social networks, but also why we might have decreasing numbers of close connections with people.

5.4.1 Understanding Social Networks

Our social networks are a crucial feature of our social lives. Social networks are a set of relationships that link an individual to other individuals. Our groups and networks are often intertwined. You could think of the groups we belong to as dense, small networks (Fine 2012), where social networks include our broader connections to a wide range of people.

The networks we belong to influence what kind of choices we make. Social networks have been found to influence our educational choices. If a lot of people in your network go to college, it will seem like the right decision to go to college. Our networks influence major life decisions, including whether we get married, divorced, and/or decide to have children. Not all network effects are positive. Our networks can also make it more likely we engage in risky behavior. This includes drug use or sexual conduct (DiMaggio and Garip 2012).

As an example, let’s explore how networks are connected to immigration. By using networks to understand immigration, we can challenge assumptions that immigration and migration are largely individual decisions. We can see how immigrants are embedded in webs of affiliation. For immigrants, their networks include a variety of people. It includes fellow immigrants, former immigrants, and non-immigrants. These ties can exist in both the place the immigrant is coming from, but also the destination of the immigrant.

There are a variety of ways networks impact immigration patterns. The existence of the network ties increases the likelihood of immigration by lowering costs, raising the benefits, and mitigating the risks of immigrating. Family members can provide their calculations if a journey is worth it. Prepaid tickets may be purchased for a potential immigrant by family or friends indicating the collective nature of decision making. The ongoing sharing of information between origin and destination about whether the economic or other conditions are conducive to immigration is also an important factor in the decisions to immigrate (Kivisto and Faist 2010).

Thinking about how our networks operate, sociologists distinguish between strong ties and weak ties. Strong ties are people that you know and have regular contact with. Often they are close family members and friends. Your strong ties allow you to have people that you trust and feel connected with. They can provide us with emotional support if we are facing a crisis. Yet our strong ties tend occupy very similar social positions as us.

Weak ties are people that are further out in your network. They are your friends of friends, co-workers, and some extended family members. These people are important for providing access to opportunities because they have connections or information that you may not have. In an influential study exploring how people found jobs, American sociologist Mark Granovetter argued that there is “strength in weak ties” (Granovetter 1973). He found that weak ties in your network can provide useful information about job opportunities. Learn more from Granovetter in the next section, “Pedagogical Element: Networks and Finding a Job.

5.4.3 Network Homophily

Our networks tend to be homophilous, meaning they tend to be composed of people that are like us. Homophily is “the principle that a contact between similar people occurs at a higher rate than among dissimilar people” (McPherson et al. 2001:416). This means the people in our networks are similar to us. This similarity is based on our race, class, education, behavior, values, and other personal characteristics. We can distinguish between status homophily and value homophily. Status homophily involves being similar to other people in our networks along the lines of sociodemographic characteristics. Value homophily involves holding similar values and beliefs as those in our networks (McPherson et al. 2001).

Since our networks tend to be similar to us in a variety of ways, let’s narrow our focus to race and age. Divisions based on race and ethnicity in networks are one of the most noticeable features in the United States. Homophily along the lines of race and ethnicity impact marriage, friendships, and who we get along with at work. White people tend to have more homogeneous networks than other racial or ethnic groups. These racial differences in networks often combine with homophily in education, work, and religion (McPherson et al. 2001).

Our networks also include people that are often very similar to us in age. In terms of close friendships, we are often friends with people that are within a few years of us in age. This is aided by schools grouping students based on age. Our ties based on age tend to be closer and last longer. You can think back, for example, to close friends you developed in elementary or middle school.

There are several reasons why people in our networks are similar to us (McPherson et al. 2001).

1. We are likely to have contact with people that are geographically close to us. Think of the neighborhood you live in and who you are regularly interacting with—most often those people are like us.
2. The internet and other technological developments may make contact with people who are more distant from us easier; often the basis of those interactions is having something in common.
3. Our families, which often are the same race/ethnicity and religion, help create another source of similarity in our networks.
4. Schools, which often draw their students from neighborhoods of similar people, also can be a source of homophily.

While our networks often are very similar to us, this can lead to some issues. The information we receive in our networks might not challenge our worldviews, but reinforce it. This could be problematic when the information is false or misleading, like what happened with the spread of misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines and lies about the 2020 election. Also, this means the diversity of the people we are interacting with is limited, which can lead to issues understanding how people outside of our groups experience the social world.

5.4.4 Social Capital

Your social networks are also tied to inequality and power. Social capital involves using social connections as a resource. As we discussed earlier, your social networks can provide you valuable information. This can be about opportunities you may not have known about. Besides providing access to valuable opportunities, social capital in networks provide a variety of support. If there are gaps between different groups in your networks and you are the one person that connects those groups. This could give you a lot of social capital. It allows you to serve as a bridge between two groups.

In an influential book, Bowling Alone, Robert Putnam (2000) argues that there has been decline in America’s social capital where people have fewer and fewer close social relationships and are more socially isolated. Instead of participating in activities with other people, such as volunteering or joining a bowling team, Americans increasingly are doing things alone. Evidence suggests that a considerable amount of the U.S. population has no one or only one person to discuss important matters with (McPherson et al. 2001). Putnam argues this creates a detrimental impact on our society where people become less trusting and disengage from their communities. This is also corrosive for our democracy if we do not have engaged citizens.