Change: How to Make Big Things Happen

by Damon Centola

How to create the change you want to see in the world using the paradigm-busting ideas in this "utterly fascinating" (Adam Grant) big-idea book.​

Most of what we know about how ideas spread comes from bestselling authors who give us a compelling picture of a world, in which "influencers" are king, "sticky" ideas "go viral," and good behavior is "nudged" forward. The problem is that the world they describe is a world where information spreads, but beliefs and behaviors stay the same.
 
When it comes to lasting change in what we think or the way we live, the dynamics are beliefs and behaviors are not transmitted from person to person in the simple way that a virus is. The real story of social change is more complex. When we are exposed to a new idea, our social networks guide our responses in striking and surprising ways.
 
Drawing on deep-yet-accessible research and fascinating examples from the spread of coronavirus to the success of the Black Lives Matter movement, the failure of Google+, and the rise of political polarization, Change presents groundbreaking and paradigm-shifting new science for understanding what drives change, and how we can change the world around us.
 

Genres: Nonfiction, Psychology, Business, Sociology, Science, Leadership, Professional Development

352 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2021

Reviews

[Stuart Macalpine · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are engaged in leadership and change work, I think this book is a bit of an instant classic.

When people think about networks, and how 'things' spread, the metaphor they use is that they are hoping that things 'go viral' and achieve a system impact. The significant insight and research Damon Centola brings to bear is that he makes one very important distinction. The things that spread like viruses (information or memes), do not spread like behaviours or norms spread.

This insight is profound for any one looking to cause systemic change, because on the whole people use virus strategies when they should be using 'complex contagion' strategies. Not only do virus strategies not work, they can also actually backfire. So examples: In the early 1970s, sociologist Mark Granovetter worked out that 'weak links' in networks organised like fireworks, where one person knows ten people who know a different ten people, who know a different ten people... spread viruses, information, and things like job opportunities very quickly. He identify how important these 'weak' links are in defining the success of the spread of information, and yes viruses. They are how memes spread, and it works very quickly. Awareness is always a bonus and supports the spread.

Here is the odd thing though - when google+ used billions of dollars resource to do this with google+ and with google glasses, it not only failed to lead to adoption, but it also built active resistance. The same is true of everything from contraception advice to better corn-seed adoption by farmers to using politically significant hashtags that have implications for reputation. Why? Because changing norms or behaviours needs high levels of redundancy amongst strong ties (peers, mentors, friends) in a close network before adoption is considered. Redundancy in a viral network is a weakness - in a complex contagion network it is fundamentally necessity. In fact, changing the number of exposures to a new idea from one peer to two peers simultaneously can lead to hugely increased uptake (the studies are shared in the text). And, the flipside is that if people have wide awareness, and know that currently their peers are not doing it, this leads to the 'viral' exposure making it likely those exposed to it will resist it more strongly, and the more they see the exposure without uptake, the more it is proof it is a bad idea. Think about the dangers, for example of advocating strongly for learning through play in schools, and simultaneously teachers can see around them that their peers do not do it.

Paying influencers or supporting single advocates in distributed networks is therefore most likely to fail if your goal is behaviour change. Centola points out that the 'myth' of influencers leading to viral uptake is almost always false - Opera Winfrey used twitter on her show after (not before) the snowball had started on the periphery. So how does that happen, how do you make change happen?

You start with local or already existing communities who have 'wide bridges' of contact with each other. You start with a group who can see each others' adoption and can see the benefits together, but also importantly validate the social acceptableness of the behaviour. From there it will begin to snow ball, and begin to spread through other 'wide bridges'. For example twitter took over San Francisco first, but did not really spread, until it started to spread up the wide bridges to the belt of university and research centres that included MIT, Harvard, Tufts... and the snowball grew.... and at somepoint Opera noticed what was already happening. It did not spread in a 'firework network' model, but a 'fishing net' model with a huge amount of redundancy and reinforcement built in at the local level.

As we consider how to support networks of schools to move towards learning through play for example, and constructivist approaches, it has some significant implications for us. Be wary of too much advocacy at the beginning and 'spreading the message'. Start local clusters who will see each other's experimentation and successes and make it socially acceptable to adopt and benefit from the practices. Think of 'snowballing' the network, not 'silver bullet' exemplars or 'shotgun exemplars across systems' (these are terms in the book).

The thinking and research in the text is profoundly helpful. It is clear that Centola has tried to put into a compelling narrative form complex research he has spent many years developing - and he has succeeded.

[عبدالرحمن عقاب · Rating 5 out of 5]

هذا كتاب رائع، مهم ونافع. و تكمن أهميته في أنّه من الكتب ذوات الطروح الجديدة والمخالفة للمعروف المألوف.فالكتاب يخالف ما استقرّ في الأذهان وتناقلته الكتب والمحاضرات؛ من أساليب الدعاية الاجتماعية، التي يُقصد منها إحداث تغيير في أفكار الناس أو سلوكهم من خلال التأثير بالمؤثر النجم (1)، والتركيز على جاذبية الجديد، واستخدام الروابط الضعيفة؛ البعيدة الممتدة (2). وهذا كله مما استقرّ على مدى عقود من الزمن.
يفرّق الكاتب بين وسيلة انتشار صورة أو مقطع مصور أو نكتةٍ ما؛ و بين انتشار فكرةٍ تحدث تغييرًا في سلوك الناس أو معتقداتهم.
هذا الفارق هو المفتاح الذي يعرض من خلاله الكاتب لآليات "العدوى" المختلفة. قالبًا الصورة الدعائية المعتادة رأسًا على عقب. هنا نراه يركز على كثافة الأثر وقوته، لا على سرعته أو مدى وصوله. فالآلية التي تحمل مقطع فيديو صُوّر في فلسطين لتصل إلى تداوله في المغرب أو البرازيل، ليست هي الآلية التي تدعونا إلى تبني رأي معين أو ارتداء لباسٍ معين، أو تغيير سلوكنا الغذائي مثلا.
يفنّد الكتاب أسطورة المؤثرين الاجتماعيين، نجوم التواصل الاجتماعي، ويعطيهم حجمهم الحقيقي في سياق معادلات التغيير الاجتماعي. وينقل الضوء والاهتمام إلى تلك الهوامش الاجتماعية المهملة في التخطيط والفاعلة في التنفيذ والتغيير.
كما يطرح أهمية ترداد الرسالة وكثافة تكرارها من المهمين، الأقرباء والأشباه مجتمعيًا، بدلاً من ورودها على لسان أو صفحة النجوم المؤثرين إعلاميا. ويطرح الكتاب أيضًا؛ وخلافًا للمستقرّ في الأذهان، أولوية الروابط البينية المتينة على الروابط الضعيفة البعيدة.
أعظم ما في الكتاب هو إعادته النظر في قضية قدرة الدعاية الاستهلاكية المباشرة على إحداث التأثير الاجتماعي. وأكبر خلل في الكتاب تجاوزه أو نسيانه للحالات التي يجتمع فيها نوعا الدعاية والتأثير صدفةً أو تخطيطًا.
بقي لي أن أشير إلى سلاسة العرض وتسلسل الأفكار، وبساطة اللغة والاقتصاد في الأمثلة التي ميّزت الكتاب.

(1) Influencres
(2) Weak ties

[کافه ادبیات · Rating 4 out of 5]

دیمون سنتولا، استاد علوم ارتباطات دانشگاه پنسیلوانیا، در کتاب «تغییر» که در سال ۲۰۲۱ توسط انتشارات لیتل براون منتشر شده، پیشرانه‌های تغییر را برایمان شرح می‌دهد؛ و از سازوکارهای تغییر در دنیای اطرافمان رمزگشایی می‌کند.

با وام‌گیری از تجربه شیوع ویروس کرونا، سنتولا نشان می‌دهد که چگونه اطلاعات در مدلی شبیه‌ همه‌گیری‌های ویروسی، به آسانی منتشر می‌شوند، اما باورها و رفتارها نزد صاحبانشان می‌مانند.

[JJ Khodadadi · Rating 5 out of 5]

کتاب درمورد تغییرات بزرگ در جامعه هست و خوندنش به شدت توصیه میشه
تاثیراتی که حلقه آشنایان و دوستان برروی حرکت جمعی دارند را با تبلیغات اینفلوانسرها مقایسه میکنه و ثابت میکنه که حرکات اصلی و تغییرات بزرگ از جمع های دوستانه و کوچک شروع میشود نه از طریق اینفلوئنسرها و...

[Debjeet Das · Rating 4 out of 5]

- [ ] The Myth of Change
- [ ] The myth of personality
- The power of highly connected social stars to spread innovation is most misleading myth- Highly influential social stars are mostly surrounded with people who beleves in status quo which prevents them from accepting innovation at earliest stage because if innovation go wrong, their social status is at stake.So they play safe.
- Greatest source of spreading innovation is to target networks of peripherial actors-our everyday friends and neighbors. Their mouth to mouth publicity can do wonders in social acceptance of innovation.
- crucial networks of social change are the interlocking ties that permeate the network periphery. If social change is to gain traction-it has to start among people who had similar experience,similar pain ,choices and challenges.
- The science of social network shows that -places are more important than people.Where confluence of social ties across different social groups strengthwn bonds between families,partnership across organisations,and solidarity within nations.
- Eg success of twitter,facebook,whatsapp,microsoft,netflix etc relied on peripherial actors -few early adopters spreads to their family,friends which spreads to even larger network and eventually leads to mass acceptance
- In al kind of revolution, key factors of people participation- is the social networks. Once people found out that citizens like them are showing up and taking a stand,they believed they could make a difference, & they wanted to be part of it too.Eg
- [ ] The myth of virality:The unexpected weakness of weak ties
- weak ties- The strength of weak ties is they expose our ideas to vast global networks of many people. Weak ties provide reach.it allows to connect with many different types of people.
- Weak ties are non- redundant link that reach outside peoples communities and connect nations together.But weak ties doesn't encourange in behavioral change towards accepting new ideas.
- strong ties- consist of close friends,family, relatives - which plays huge role in accepting innovation
- The success of twitter and facebook relied on something different- new and invisible pattern of strong ties, pattern that exists within local neighbourhood but also stretches across country.They were exploiting-network of people who are socially together but geographically far apart.
- [ ] The myth of stickiness- why great innovations fail
- The product with incremental change/inferior product gain traction early on with individual in crucial network locations.superior product/competitor fails to dislodge it.The Power of incumbancy is huge.
- For radical innovation, aggressive,catch marketing doesnt work to change peoples behavior and belief. Cultural and social norms embedded in our networks can create enduring opposition to change.New products and ideas are not easily adopted when they threaten established beliefs and social norms.
- Google’s Grapefruit Problem- google glass was a great product and it was launched with aggressive marketing. The reach of the product was huge.But the problem was If you create a massive awareness about your product and simultaneously differentiate between early adopters and non-adopters, it can be deadly. The product never took off among masses.
- Massive awareness and lack of use means the stronger the implicit signal from all of those non-adopters that there’s something wrong with it.It happened with google +
- Social technology requires social coordination. People need to make move together.
- Another example- korea contraception problem- The Korean birth-control program began simply enough. Villages throughoutthe country were offered a list of contraceptive options: the pill, condoms etc. Some villages were successful,while others not . So what differentiates?
- The explainations lie in social ties wthin each village. These social ties determined success or failure
- Successful villages all had a similar social-network pattern: there were clusters of strong ties among friends and neighbors. There were also strong ties between the various clusters. These redundant social connections were the reinforcing pathways that spread contraception from one cluster to the next, across different social groups in the village. Unsuccessful villages did not have these reinforcing networks.
- In the end, villagers’ receptiveness to contraception was based not on the qualities of a contraceptive method but on their receiving social approval from other adopters.The early adopters were tightly knit “women’s groups”—friendship-andadvice circles in each village—in which local women could talk about contraception and share their experiences with it.
- The Zimbabwe Experiment-This story starts in 2001, when Zimbabwe was being devastated by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. But acceptance of condoms was low—no one wanted to use them—and circumcision campaigns had backfired. These programs were viewed as cultural profanities that violated villagers’ religious beliefs. Then scientist found a PrEP which is a miracle drug.It can eliminate HIV transmission.
- The administration ran a campaign The campaign drove the message home: PrEP is free, easy to use, and will save your life. But it was shockingly ineffective. why? People worried that their friends and neighbors would find out that they were taking the medication, and therefore suspect that they had already contracted. They did not want to risk any misunderstandings or rumors about their HIV status—which would be difficult, perhaps impossible, to eradicate if they ever took hold HIV. Answer to this lies in infrastructure of contagion.
- [ ] How to build contagion infrastructure?
- People need to receive reinforcement from multiple adopters to be convinced- and for the new behavior to propagate. The higher the stake of decision and greater the uncertainty,the more"proof " people require-from multiple peers.
- 4 barrier of adoption
1. coordination- some innovations are useful only if more people use them together. The more people adopt ,the more valuable innovation becomes like social media
2. credibility- People are sometime skeptical of innovations effectiveness or safety. Social proof /confirmation matters when people adopts new innovation. Repeated confirmation by trusted others overcomes credibility behavior.
3. legitimacy- the barrier is the risk of embarrasment or a tarnished reputation.Think of fashion ,same sex marriage etc .solution- social reinforcement from respected peers.
4. excitement- Things are appealing when only when people are emotionally energized by one others. The more people who are adoptiong ,the more other people excited about adopting it. For eg in political rallies, social movements etc.
- weak ties-

- The geometry of weak-tie networks looks a lot like a fireworks display. weak ties reach out randomly in every direction. Information spread out at light speed and it reaches to lots pf people across different network,but it didnt trigger many adopters.
- There is very little social redundancy in weak ties. These people tend not to be connected to one another’s friends. They have very few contacts in common.
- strong ties-

- The geometry of strong-tie networks looks more like a fishing net. This pattern, often referred to as network clustering, is distinctive for its abundance of social redundancy. People are connected to one another’s friends.
- Network redundancy does double duty. Initially, reinforcing messages
- from multiple peer showed the coordination value and credibility of the innovation. That led to adoption.More neighbors who adopted meant more recommendations, which meant more value.
- The fishing-net pattern fosters trust and intimacy. This is because social redundancy makes people accountable
- [ ] complex contagion- memes,bots,political change
- For viral success of memes- sending repeated messages from a single source did not work. The crucial factor for the spread of these memes was not whether people received the same message multiple times, but whether they received the message from multiple sources.
- People who received reinforcing signals from the same bot were actually less likely to adopt the meme than people who received only one signal.more reinforcing signals the better: adoption rates soared as more bots offered social confirmation for the same meme.
- [ ] contagion infrastructure- the importannce of wide bridge
-
- Narrow bridge offers rare opportunity for useful information to spread. between 2 groups. In contrast, wide bridge reflects true collaboration.it involves a group of people from one division engaging with teams from another through multiple overlapping connections.
- When multiple ties exist between groups, there are more opportunities for people on both sides to observe one another .Greater bridge width increases the trustworthiness of the information coming from other parts of an organization.
- For any organizational change - the barrier to overcome are- trust,risk- as innovation would dismantle their routine work ,decreasing their speed initially but the greatest obstacle is coordination- to mae innovation successful- every member of different teams must embraceit and use it.
- Organizational learning begins with an infrastructure that can support the flow of innovation and coordination across organizational boundaries.
- [ ] Principle of relevance- Power of people like us and unike us.
- Relevance is key to understanding how the right contagion infrastructure helps to spread behavior change.
- The more that people are like us, the more easily we can empathize with them, and the more inclined we are to take their choices seriously.
- key is context. Whether or not a contact is seen as relevant for you is largely determined by the situation
- For eg in weight loss programme- to spread new health technology-people were far more likely to adopt the innovation when they received notifications from people whose fitness profiles were like theirs—in fact, a whopping 200 percent more likely.
- 3 rules of relevance
1. When people need social proof that a particular innovation will be useful for them, then similarity with earlier adopters is a key factor for creating relevance. for eg adoption of new diet,exercise programme etc.
2. When behavior change requires a degree of emotional excitement, or feelings of loyalty and solidarity, then—once again —similarity among the sources of reinforcement will help to inspire behavior change. Eg in battle force, political rally
3. When behavior change is based on legitimacy—that is, believing that the behavior is widely accepted—then the opposite is true: diversity among reinforcing sources of adoption is key for spreading the innovation
- [ ] The 25 Percent Tipping Point
- Norm- norms serve an important purpose. They make our lives feel orderly and, well, normal.The reason that changing a social norm is difficult is the same reason that learning a new language is difficult: it requires breaking something that works. It requires replacing something familiar and natural with something new and foreign.
- But through effective social coordination these norms can be changed. every coordination game had within it a tipping point—the point at which a novel behavior gained enough traction that everyone’s opinion about what was acceptable would suddenly change. It meant that an entire population could be efficiently ferried from one social norm to another just by triggering a critical number of early adopters.
- tipping point was really just the point at which people could no longer coordinate with one another without changing their behavior.
- Each community started off in anarchy. But small sparks of coordination quickly led people to coordinate on the same behavior that their peers—and theirpeers’ peers, and their peers’ peers’ peers. Once a norm took hold, everyone knew what to expect from one another. Once everyone was coordinating, they had good reason to stick with the norm they had established.
- Below the tipping point even the large increase in activism have no effect on the rest of population.
- [ ] The Blind spot in the Mind is "I": unexpected triggers for tipping points.
- The vast majority of the time, the social influences altering people’s behavior take place beyond their field of vision—in their blind spot. people explain their own behavior in terms of what they feel inside, rather than what is happening outside.
- People’s beliefs about their own motivations may be the least reliable explanation for their behavior
- The success of renewable energy in European countries is not only due to financial incentives but also due to social adoption- people started using these technologies when their friends,neighbors,colleagues did.
- Snowball strategy- snowball strategy is based on targeting special places in the social network where an innovation can take hold. The goal of the snowball strategy is not to convince everyone to adopt at once. Rather, it is to incubate support for your innovation. It is to grow a critical mass.
- The key to the snowball strategy is that all of your change agents know one another.
- Because your change agents are all part of the same social cluster, they have social connections with the same nonadopters This enables change agents to coordinate their efforts to increase the legitimacy and credibility of innovation among their mutual friends and shared neighbors
- social reinforcement across wide bridges enables a new norm to propagate by spilling over from one social cluster to another. This is how the snowball strategy succeeds.
- [ ] Discord, disruption and discovery
- [ ] The Power of Fishing-Net Teams
- diffusion, requires social clustering. The reason is that clustering preserves diversity. Not demographic diversity but informational diversity.Because fishing nets were less efficient for spreading information, they prevented news of an early, pretty good discovery from reaching everyone on the team too quickly. By slowing down information, the fishing net “protected” researchers from exposure to solutions that might take them off the track of discovering something truly innovative that no one else was anticipating.
- The networks that were less efficient for information were more efficient for exploration.
- By slowing down the spread of information, the fishing-net pattern increased the efficiency with which teams could explore new ideas.
- The hallmark of a well-designed team is that it preserves intellectual diversity while enabling coordination.
- Networks that facilitate the spread of ideas are necessary for innovation. But if innovations spread too rapidly, or if connectedness is too great or too centralized, societies lose the capacity for independent exploration.
- [ ] BIAS, BELIEF
- People’s social networks often reinforce their belief systems, which can make it difficult for people who see the world differently to come to a shared agreement on content

[J Haydel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this book in a publisher giveaway.

This book fits neatly in the big-idea genre. The big idea here is compelling and made me think about many potential connections, such as the different styles of discussion in a synchronous vs. asynchronous class discussion (an application of the big idea not addressed in the book).

The book also has the negatives of the big-idea genre. Individual case studies were very superficial, and other potential explanations for outcomes not addressed.

The author’s writing is accessible and engaging. This would be great for undergraduates in Sociology and Political Science.

[Calvin Isch · Rating 5 out of 5]

Complex contagions and collective intelligence are fascinating ideas to think about. So excited to be spending that next few years trying to better understand and contribute to this work with Damon!

[Md Akhlaq · Rating 4 out of 5]

Professor Damon Centola is the world expert in the new science of networks. His ground-breaking research across areas as disparate as voting, health, technology and finance has highlighted powerful and highly effective new ways to ensure lasting change.

In this book, Centola distils over a decade of deep experience into a striking new theory that questions previous assumptions that new ideas are either contagious or not.

This book is so different. The author explains things like scientific research and development, social networks for optimising innovations etc using simple and ordinary instances from the common surrounding.  It provides a good synopsis as to how change can happen and why it so often flunks.

This book shows what the brand-new science of networks tells us about how and why and when human behaviour changes, and the factors that infer the spread of social change, explain why we've misunderstood them for so long, and demonstrate how they work. This book uncovers numerous mysterious societal transformations with the help of proved instances. Exploring how social norms work, and what happens when they are violated. I did get a kick out of skimming about these numerous examples of change being brought about through networks of relationships in society.

Very enlightening and highly engaging. An addictive read - one of the most compelling business books I've ever read.

[Meg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some things I learned:
- Simple contagions, like viruses, gossip, and news benefit from reach and influencers
- Complex contagions - behaviors people resist, like getting a vaccine, adopting a new technology, or making a lifestyle shift - benefit from strong ties, tightly connected networks.
- To spread behavior change and to grow a movement - like the Movement for Black Lives - repeated exposure is needed to influence change, wide bridges between networks of close ties are essential...
- The pattern, rather than the number, of connections matters
- Shift the goal from spreading information to propagating norms

[sumo · Rating 5 out of 5]

- don’t count on contagiousness
- protect the innovators
- use the network periphery
- establish wide bridges to spread complex contagion
- create relevance (context is key)
- similarity with the adopters (credibility)
- similarity among the sources of reinforcement (excitement)
- diversity among sources when behavior change is based on legitimacy (belief it’s widely accepted)
- snowball strategy (special places not special people)
- know the community and its boundaries
- target bridging groups
- design team networks to improve discovery and reduce bias

[John Stepper · Rating 4 out of 5]

The main idea, contrasting simple vs complex contagions and providing strategies for each, is useful and practical. (Spreading behavior change or "culture", for example, requires a different approach than spreading a virus or news.) I especially appreciated the notes and resources at the end which provide delicious leads for further research.

[The Senzy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Appreciated the recent current takes and examples of viral situations that helped complexify gladwell's take on how change happens from the tipping point. my main takeaway is the patterns of community in fishnet vs firework and how that impacts how news travel very interesting read

[Vinod Narayan · Rating 5 out of 5]

On Podcast
https://anchor.fm/penpositive/episode...

[asih simanis · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting and mind-bending book.

One of the most interesting thing to ponder for me is how do we change or shape society? This book tries to answer that.

Centola uses the very young science of network theory to explain to us firstly how ideas spread and secondly (though arguably most importantly), how behavior is changed. In this book he patiently explained the misconception we have on how the two work, and tries to lay bare the true mechanisms of change as suggested by the most recent studies.

The most interesting point for me was the differentiation between simple and complex contagion. Ideas and information, are simple contagion and therefore can be spread quite easily via ways we are all so familiar with (viral tiktok videos, media outlets etc), but behavior change is different. That would be a complex contagion, and simply spreading awareness of the importance of changing behavior will not change behavior. Depending on the level of difficulty of the behaviors adaptation, different strategies would be needed.

The strategies we need to employ are then explained very well by Centola here, and what fascinates me is how the strategies are a reverse on what we usually think we must do to change peoples behavior.

Many of the strategies and points explained in the book will surely stay with me for awhile, though admittedly how to adopt this into my own agenda in shaping the world around me remains a question worth pursuing.

Ps: the reason I gave 4 starts instead of 5 is because the book could’ve been significantly shorter. The examples are not all interesting and the writing is not the best. But in terms of explaining science to dummies, it’s still worth the read if the topic is of interest to you.

Another pain point for me was that the writer was a little too self absorbed and constantly in need of proofing his legitimacy or the studies legitimacy. I would’ve appreciated that the legitimizing parts be put in notes instead, and that he would’ve focused just on more fluent and easy to read storytelling. But that’s just my taste.

[Jeffrey · Rating 5 out of 5]

My criteria for a non-fiction to earn 5 stars : needs to change my understanding of the world

This book meets this criteria. A theme that has emerged for me this year is the relationship of individual beliefs to the larger community. Our understanding of it, in particular with respect to social media is, I believe, is embryotic and evolving rapidly. This is difficult topic to wrap my head around and the concepts in this book are difficult for me to really grasp. However, it is quite a worthwhile read.

Centola cites many pyschological studies, including several that he conducted himself. A persistent cognitive illusion we all are subject to is that we believe we think for ourselves but in fact we are significantly influenced by our community (this is not the facile statement it appears to be (i.e. I know what you are thinking...))

His conclusions appear to be well supported and delightfully counter inuitive. Some of the headlines of his conclusions are: 'influencers" don't make social change i.e. don't look to special people for those who change beliefs - look to special places, myth of virality i.e. the myth of the stenght of weak ties, complex ideas are adopted through strong ties and wide bridges.

[Tobias Leenaert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting and useful theories - though all of it could probably have been said with way less words.
Have to think about how the ideas can be applied to the animal protection/vegan movement

[Wieke · Rating 3 out of 5]

Centola is duidelijk expert in netwerktheorie. Door de hoeveelheid onderzoeken die hij gedaan heeft, is de eerste helft van het boek niet heel doortastend en vrij saai: de voorbeelden en onderzoeksresultaten zijn niet genoeg uitgediept en de conclusies worden veel herhaald. De tweede helft van het boek vond ik een stuk leuker: concrete toepassingen, betere voorbeelden. Al met al een leerzaam boek, en leuk om te kijken naar de bruikbaarheid van netwerken niet alleen voor het individu, maar ook voor sociale impact.

[Sophia]

Ughhhhh I actually read this a while ago for a class so my specific frustrations have faded, but I think my overarching problem was that this is another hot new way to apply math (in this case network theory) to sociology. I’m a computational modeler, I build models for a living, and I don’t think what they are saying is uninteresting, but imo it edges towards the dehumanization somewhat inherent whenever individuals are abstracted away by modelers striving to explain (or predict) human behavior. It wasn’t uninteresting, and I’m open to being convinced that the ideas aren’t dangerous, but at this point I’m highly skeptical.

[Ezra · Rating 5 out of 5]

I heard about this book first on Hidden Brain (which I guess is an influencer distribution model) and I wanted to hear more. Great way of understanding the spread and adoption of ideas works in the world.

[David Bedolla G · Rating 4 out of 5]

Los conceptos principales son innovadores; tienen aplicaciones en cualquier campo que requiera un cambio social, cambio de prácticas, cambio de hábitos o cambio de cultura. Vale la pena experimentar y poner en práctica lo que propone. Un poco repetitivo en los ejemplos.

[Orla · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would recommend this to anyone trying to undertake change in existing systems.

[Mark Cosgrave · Rating 3 out of 5]

How big things happen. I wasn't smart enough to be able to apply the learnings in this book to my problem. It did offer some insights

[Taylor Barkley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting case studies throughout. The main point is fairly simple although non intuitive. A little too long. A helpful read for those in advocacy of any kind.

[Amirmansour · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great read
A true eye opener
👍👍👍

[Dag Ryland · Rating 5 out of 5]

En av de mest interessante bøkene jeg har lest de siste årene. Har skrevet et sammendrag av boken på min personlige nettside: https://dagryland.com/hvordan-endring...

[Charles Daney · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm giving this a top rating, because I found the main thesis very compelling, and in contradiction with the conventional "wisdom" on the subject. As the title implies, it's about changing the minds of many people in a society, though not at an individual level. That is, it won't be of much help in changing the minds of your friends and acquaintances on a 1-to-1 basis. Instead, it's about how opinions of a relatively large group of people - in a geographic area, large business or organization, or a local community. It has that focus, because the thesis is that opinions in a group can be changed by understanding how new ideas spread through the social relationship network.

The conventional wisdom is that "complex" ideas spread like a viral infection. It (supposedly) begins with a small number of people who are "infected" with a novel idea, and then spreads gradually through a group of people by random interactions. Even one contact between individuals can be sufficient for the "infection" to pass from one person to another. This actually does work for "simple" ideas or behaviors - but not, Centola contends, for "complex" ideas or behaviors.

What's a "simple" idea? A good example is a suggestion from a friend or a review online for a certain new movie or streaming series. If it's something of the sort you like, you'll probably watch it. A much more "complex" idea would be when, for example, a new CEO starts at a medium-size business and wants to change procedures that have long been in effect. That could be a lot more difficult to sell to the current managers and staff.

What is it that makes this second situation complex? It's human nature. People don't like to change the way they've done things for a long time. They're used to doing things in a routine way. They're reluctant to learn new procedures. They don't want to have to deal with people they're not used to dealing with. They're afraid of change because there will be new uncertainties. Overcoming these problems will require careful planning and execution for the person who believes the change will ultimately be worthwhile.

Social networks can be graphed in ways that are now somewhat familiar. One pattern is that a group or society consists of a number of clusters that are fairly isolated from each other but may have a fairly small amount of overlap with other clusters. In each cluster there are a few individuals who have many connections with other individuals who have far fewer connections with each other. A contagion spreads from one cluster to another through a small number of individuals who have connections with both clusters.

The other model, which Centola thinks is much more important, has individuals in a cluster having many connections with others in the cluster. Although a new idea can be introduced from outside, the idea spreads within the cluster because each individual is conected with others. When an individual has "enough" connections to others in the group who have accepted the new idea, that individual is more likely to accept the idea also. That's because a single individual is more likely to accept a new idea if it's already accepted by a sufficient number of others in the group. Being connected with only one or two others is usually not sufficient, but what number actually is sufficient depends on the number of interconnections, as well as the persuasiveness of the idea. A "tipping point" occurs, after which a large enough percentage of individuals accept the new idea. The tipping point can occur with perhaps only 25% of the group accepting the new idea, because most others in the group have a relatively large number of connections with people in the initial 25%.

Of course, this is all pretty abstract. However, in an earlier book (How Behavior Spreads), Centola presents the result of controlled experiments with groups of people who are connected in different types of social networks. The experiments show that people are most likely to accept a new idea if they are connected with enough others who've already accepted the idea. Only one or two connections aren't usually enough. The present book goes beyond theory and experimental results to present a number of case studies of groups, such as from people in a large modern organization and members of a regional farming community. The case studies show the techniques that led to a particular new idea successfully spreading.

[Joseph L. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Watch a detailed review along with my favorite ideas and takeaways at:
https://youtu.be/JbsXmQ3EAVE

[Emma Berger · Rating 3 out of 5]

So I didn’t love it. I found some of the examples a bit boring and hard to get through; overall it seemed awfully repetitive and a bit complicated (but I suppose that’s the field I got myself into).

But it did spark some ideas for my club :).

I just wish there was a playbook addition to this or a summary - there’s one at the end but I don’t think it compiles everything very usefully.

[Yogini · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read book.

[Bilal · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read Damon Centola’s first book on the subject, How Behavior Spreads, about two years ago, and I knew immediately that he was delivering a golden insight into understanding societal behavior, and that I would be looking forward to when he comes up with a follow-up with further clarity. Well, here he is with “Change.”

The subject matter is the same as in “How Behavior Spreads”, however, as I was hoping, the author has built upon his earlier work with a significantly enlarged set of empirical evidence collected from across a wider gamut of scenarios and tested against a larger set of counter possibilities, resulting in deeper insight and clarity. While the first book read like a PhD thesis converted into a book, this one is originally crafted as a book for mass readership. This will make it more accessible for people with all sorts of backgrounds.

More specifically, in addition to how behavior spreads, Damon has added considerable material on quantifying the tipping point, and on how and where a change should be introduced in a society to make it most likely to be adopted. He provides many online contrived examples as well as many real-world applications of how this works out; as well as when it does not.

On the other hand, I found a few parts of Section IV weak, most prominently the one about China. He attributes China’s failure to capitalize on its naval superiority to discover the Americas and control the World as the Europeans managed later to its social network structure for transfer of information. Moreover, he makes sweeping judgments about China not becoming the global superpower that it could have been before the European Renaissance to its social network pattern as he postulates it existed over thousands of years of Chinese history. Maybe he is right, but when we talk about antiquity with little information in front of us, it is important for the author to detail how he has concluded that China’s society was connected in the way that he says it was, and over several thousands of years! Therefore, this part comes across as the author trying to explain an outcome of antiquity or of several hundred years ago to fit the model that the author has devised. Anyway, this is an unfortunate outlier in the otherwise insightful book.