44. Background and quotes from author interview with Nicholas Christakis, June 2018.
45. Snijders T.A.B., ‘The Spread of Evidence-Poor Medicine via Flawed Social-Network Analysis’, SOCNET Archives, 17 June 2011.
46. Granovetter M.S., ‘The Strength of Weak Ties’, American Journal of Sociology, 1973.
47. Dhand A., ‘Social networks and risk of delayed hospital arrival after acute stroke’, Nature Communications, 2019.
48. Background from: Centola D. and Macy M., ‘Complex Contagions and the Weakness of Long Ties’, American Journal of Sociology, 2007; Centola D., How Behavior Spreads: The Science of Complex Contagions (Princeton University Press, 2018).
49. Darley J.M. and Latane B., ‘Bystander intervention in emergencies: Diffusion of responsibility’, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1968.
50. Centola D., How Behavior Spreads: The Science of Complex Contagions (Princeton University Press, 2018).
51. Coviello L. et al., ‘Detecting Emotional Contagion in Massive Social Networks’, PLOS ONE, 2014; Aral S. and Nicolaides C., ‘Exercise contagion in a global social network’, Nature Communications, 2017.
52. Fleischer D., Executive Summary. The Prop 8 Report, 2010. http://prop8report.lgbtmentoring.org/read-the-report/executive-summary.
53. Background on deep canvassing from: Issenberg S., ‘How Do You Change Someone’s Mind About Abortion? Tell Them You Had One’, Bloomberg, 6 October 2014; Resnick B., ‘These scientists can prove it’s possible to reduce prejudice’, Vox, 8 April 2016; Bohannon J., ‘For real this time: Talking to people about gay and transgender issues can change their prejudices’, Associated Press, 7 April 2016.
54. Mandel D.R., ‘The psychology of Bayesian reasoning’, Frontiers in Psychology, 2014.
55. Nyhan B. and Reifler J., ‘When Corrections Fail: The persistence of political misperceptions’, Political Behavior, 2010.
56. Wood T. and Porter E., ‘The elusive backfire effect: mass attitudes’ steadfast factual adherence’, Political Behavior, 2018.
57. LaCour M.H. and Green D.P., ‘When contact changes minds: An experiment on transmission of support for gay equality’, Science, 2014.
58. Broockman D. and Kalla J., ‘Irregularities in LaCour (2014)’, Working paper, May 2015.
59. Duran L., ‘How to change views on trans people? Just get personal’, Take Two®, 7 April 2016.
60. Comment from: Gelman A., ‘LaCour and Green 1, This American Life 0’, 16 December 2015. https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2015/12/16/lacour-and-green-1-this-american-life-0/
61. Wood T. and Porter E., ‘The elusive backfire effect: mass attitudes’ steadfast factual adherence’, Political Behavior, 2018.
62. Weiss R. and Fitzgerald M., ‘Edwards, First Lady at Odds on Stem Cells’, Washington Post, 10 August 2004.
63. Quotes from author interview with Brendan Nyhan, November 2018.
64. Nyhan B. et al., ‘Taking Fact-checks Literally But Not Seriously? The Effects of Journalistic Fact-checking on Factual Beliefs and Candidate Favorability’, Political Behavior, 2019.
65. Example: https://twitter.com/brendannyhan/status/
859573499333136384.
66. Strudwick P.A., ‘Former MP Has Made A Heartfelt Apology For Voting Against Same-Sex Marriage’, BuzzFeed, 28 March 2017.
67. There’s also evidence that people who have changed their mind about a topic, and explain why they’ve changed their mind, can be more persuasive than a simple one-sided message. Source: Lyons B.A. et al., ‘Conversion messages and attitude change: Strong arguments, not costly signals’, Public Understanding of Science, 2019.
68. Feinberg M. and Willer R., ‘From Gulf to Bridge: When Do Moral Arguments Facilitate Political Influence?’, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 2015.
69. Roghanizad M.M. and Bohns V.K., ‘Ask in person: You’re less persuasive than you think over email’, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2016.
70. How J.J. and De Leeuw E.D., ‘A comparison of nonresponse in mail, telephone, and face-to-face surveys’, Quality and Quantity, 1994; Gerber A.S. and Green D.P., ‘The Effects of Canvassing, Telephone Calls, and Direct Mail on Voter Turnout: A Field Experiment’, American Political Science Review, 2000; Okdie B.M. et al., ‘Getting to know you: Face-to-face versus online interactions’, Computers in Human Behavior, 2011.
71. Swire B. et al., ‘The role of familiarity in correcting inaccurate information’, Journal of Experimental Psychology Learning Memory and Cognition, 2017.
72. Quotes from author interview with Briony Swire-Thompson, July 2018.
73. Broockman D. and Kalla J., ‘Durably reducing transphobia: A field experiment on door-to-door canvassing’, Science, 2016.
4. Something in the air
1. Background and quotes from author interview with Gary Slutkin, April 2018.
2. Statistics from: Bentle K. et al., ‘39,000 homicides: Retracing 60 years of murder in Chicago’, Chicago Tribune, 9 January 2018; Illinois State Fact Sheet. National Injury and Violence Prevention Resource Center, 2015.
3. Slutkin G., ‘Treatment of violence as an epidemic disease’, In: Fine P. et al. John Snow’s legacy: epidemiology without borders. The Lancet, 2013.
4. Background on John Snow’s work on cholera from: Snow J., On the mode of communication of cholera. (London, 1855); Tulodziecki D., ‘A case study in explanatory power: John Snow’s conclusions about the pathology and transmission of cholera’, Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 2011; Hempel S., ‘John Snow’, The Lancet, 2013; Brody H. et al., ‘Map-making and myth-making in Broad Street: the London cholera epidemic, 1854’, The Lancet, 2000.
5. Reason for abstraction: Seuphor M., Piet Mondrian: Life and Work (Abrams, New York, 1956); Tate Modern, ‘Five ways to look at Malevich’s Black Square’, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/kazimir-malevich-1561/five-ways-look-malevichs-black-square.
6. Background on cholera: Locher W.G., ‘Max von Pettenkofer (1818–1901) as a Pioneer of Modern Hygiene and Preventive Medicine’, Environmental Health and Preventive Medicine, 2007; Morabia A., ‘Epidemiologic Interactions, Complexity, and the Lonesome Death of Max von Pettenkofer,’ American Journal of Epidemiology, 2007.
7. García-Moreno C. et al., ‘WHO Multi-country Study on Women’s Health and Domestic Violence against Women’, World Health Organization, 2005.
8. Quotes from author interview with Charlotte Watts, May 2018.
9. Background on factors influencing contagion of violence: Patel D.M. et al., Contagion of Violence: Workshop Summary (National Academies Press, 2012).
10. Gould M.S. et al., ‘Suicide Clusters: A Critical Review’, Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior, 1989.
11. Cheng Q. et al., ‘Suicide Contagion: A Systematic Review of Definitions and Research Utility’, PLOS ONE, 2014.
12. Phillips D.P., ‘The Influence of Suggestion on Suicide: Substantive and Theoretical Implications of the Werther Effect’, American Sociological Review, 1974.
13. WHO. ‘Is responsible and deglamourized media reporting effective in reducing deaths from suicide, suicide attempts and acts of self-harm?’, 2015. https://www.who.int.
14. Fink D.S. et al., ‘Increase in suicides the months after the death of Robin Williams in the US’, PLOS ONE, 2018.
15. Towers S. et al., ‘Contagion in Mass Killings and School Shootings’,
