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Friendship paradox biases perceptions in directed networks.

ABSTRACT: Social networks shape perceptions by exposing people to the actions and opinions of their peers. However, the perceived popularity of a trait or an opinion may be very different from its actual popularity. We attribute this perception bias to friendship paradox and identify conditions under which it appears. We validate the findings empirically using Twitter data. Within posts made by users in our sample, we identify topics that appear more often within users' social feeds than they do globally among all posts. We also present a polling algorithm that leverages the friendship paradox to obtain a statistically efficient estimate of a topic's global prevalence from biased individual perceptions. We characterize the polling estimate and validate it through synthetic polling experiments on Twitter data. Our paper elucidates the non-intuitive ways in which the structure of directed networks can distort perceptions and presents approaches to mitigate this bias.

SUBMITTER: Alipourfard N

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7002371 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Friendship paradox biases perceptions in directed networks.

Alipourfard Nazanin N Nettasinghe Buddhika B Abeliuk Andrés A Krishnamurthy Vikram V Lerman Kristina K

Nature communications 20200205 1

Social networks shape perceptions by exposing people to the actions and opinions of their peers. However, the perceived popularity of a trait or an opinion may be very different from its actual popularity. We attribute this perception bias to friendship paradox and identify conditions under which it appears. We validate the findings empirically using Twitter data. Within posts made by users in our sample, we identify topics that appear more often within users' social feeds than they do globally ...[more]

PMID: 32024843

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Project description:Over 1.9 billion individuals require preventive chemotherapy through mass drug administration (MDA). Community-directed MDA relies on volunteer community medicine distributors (CMDs) and their achievement of high coverage and compliance. Yet, it is unknown if village social networks influence effective MDA implementation by CMDs. In Mayuge District, Uganda, census-style surveys were conducted for 16,357 individuals from 3,491 households in 17 villages. Praziquantel, albendazole, and ivermectin were administered for one month in community-directed MDA to treat Schistosoma mansoni, hookworm, and lymphatic filariasis. Self-reported treatment outcomes, socioeconomic characteristics, friendship networks, and health advice networks were collected. We investigated systematically missed coverage and noncompliance. Coverage was defined as an eligible person being offered at least one drug by CMDs; compliance included ingesting at least one of the offered drugs. These outcomes were analyzed as a two-stage process using a Heckman selection model. To further assess if MDA through CMDs was working as intended, we examined the probability of accurate drug administration of 1) praziquantel, 2) both albendazole and ivermectin, and 3) all drugs. This analysis was conducted using bivariate Probit regression. Four indicators from each social network were examined: degree, betweenness centrality, closeness centrality, and the presence of a direct connection to CMDs. All models accounted for nested household and village standard errors. CMDs were more likely to offer medicines, and to accurately administer the drugs as trained by the national control programme, to individuals with high friendship degree (many connections) and high friendship closeness centrality (households that were only a short number of steps away from all other households in the network). Though high (88.59%), additional compliance was associated with directly trusting CMDs for health advice. Effective treatment provision requires addressing CMD biases towards influential, well-embedded individuals in friendship networks and utilizing health advice networks to increase village trust in CMDs.

Project description:BackgroundThis study attempted to identify the sources of job stress according to job position and investigate how friendship networks affect job stress.MethodsQuestionnaires based on The Health Professions Stress Inventory (HPSI) developed by Wolfgang experienced by healthcare providers were collected from 420 nurses, doctors and radiological technologists in two general hospitals in Korea by a multistage cluster sampling method. Multiple regression analysis was used to examine the effects of friendship networks on job stress after controlling for other factors.ResultsThe severity of job stress differed according to level of job demands (p = .006); radiologic technologists experienced the least stress (45.4), nurses experienced moderate stress (52.4), and doctors experienced the most stress (53.6). Those with long-term friendships characterized by strong connections reported lower levels of stress than did those with weak ties to friends among nurses (1.3, p < .05) and radiological technologists (11.4, p < .01). The degree of cohesion among friends had a positive impact on the level of job stress experienced by nurses (8.2, p < .001) and radiological technologists (14.6, p < .1). Doctors who participated in workplace alumni meetings scored higher than those who did not. However, those who participated in alumni meetings outside the workplace showed the opposite tendency, scoring 9.4 (p < .05) lower than those who did not. The resources from their friendship network include both information and instrumental support. As most radiological technologists were male, their instrumental support positively affected their job stress (9.2, p < .05). Life information support was the primary positive contributor to control of nurses' (4.1, p < .05), radiological technologists' (8.0, p < .05) job stress.ConclusionThe strength and density of such friendship networks were related to job stress. Life information support from their friendship network was the primary positive contributor to control of job stress.

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Friendship paradox biases perceptions in directed networks.

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Friendship paradox biases perceptions in directed networks.

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