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[1] HOW MEN AND WOMEN MANAGE THEIR SOCIAL NETWORKS DIFFERENTLY
[2] A new study of online behavior reveals that men and women organize their social networks very differently.
[3] One of the interesting insights that social networks offer is the
[4] difference between male and female behaviour.
[5] In the past, behavioural differences have been hard to measure.
[6] Experiments could only be done on limited numbers of
[7] individuals and even then, the process of measurement often
[8] distorted people’s behaviour.
[9] That’s all changed with the advent of massive online
[10] participation ∈ gaming, professional and friendship networks.
[11] For the first time, it has become possible to quantify exactly
[12] how the genders differ ∈ their approach to things like risk and
[13] communication.
[14] Earlier this year, for example, we looked at a remarkable study
[15] of a mobile phone network that demonstrated the different
[16] reproductive strategies that men and women employ throughout
[17] their lives, as revealed by how often they call friends, family and potential mates.
[18] Today, Michael Szell and Stefan Thurner at the Medical University of Vienna ∈Austria say they’ve found significant
[19] differences ∈ the way men and women manage their social networks ∈ an online game called Pardus with over
[20] 300,000 players. In this game, players explore various solar systems ∈a virtual universe. On the way, they can
[21] mark other players as friends or enemies, exchange messages, gain wealth by trading or doing battle but can also
[22] be killed.
[23] The interesting thing about online games is that almost every action of every player is recorded, mostly without the
[24] players being consciously aware of this. That means measurement bias is minimal.
[25] The networks of friends and enemies that are set up also differ ∈ an important way from those on social networking
[26] sites such as Facebook. That’s because players can neither see nor influence other players’ networks. This prevents
[27] the kind of clustering and herding behaviour that sometimes dominates other social networks.
[28] Szell and Thurner say the data reveals clear and significant differences between men and women ∈Pardus. For
[29] example, men and women interact with the opposite sex differently. ”Males reciprocate friendship requests from
[30] females faster than vice versa and hesitate to reciprocate hostile actions of females,” say Szell and Thurner. Women
[31] are also significantly more risk averse than men as measured by the amount of fighting they engage ∈ and their
[32] likelihood of dying. They are also more likely to be friends with each other than men.
[33] These results are more or less as expected. More surprising is the finding that women tend to be more wealthy than
[34] men, probably because they engage more ∈ economic than destructive behaviour.
[35] One obvious problem is that of gender swapping: men who play as women and vice versa. Szell and Thurner say that
[36] other studies have shown that around ten per cent of online gaming populations engage ∈ gender swapping. They
[37] say there’s no reason to think this would be any different ∈Pardus and that it shouldn’t affect the results.
[38] A more serious problem could be the well known phenomenon that women tend to receive better treatment ∈ maledominated
[39] online gaming communities. Indeed, Szell and Thurner say they can see evidence of this ∈ their data.
[40] That’s something they’ll need to look into ∈ more detail.
Technology Review published by MIT, 23/05/2012
Adapted from http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/27870/
A forma comparativa destacada na frase “More surprising is the finding that women tend to be more wealthy than men” (linha 33) poderia ser corretamente substituída por
