Directional influence and the Obama question

A few days ago I read an interesting post by Auren Hoffman on homophily – the phenomenon of being affected by one's friends and close associates. Intuitively this makes sense – we all make decisions influenced by those around us.

But there’s an important distinction to make between the existence of influence and its direction. What I mean is this: you might be influenced in the purchase of a new digital camera by a friend who has bought one recently. But are you more or less likely to buy the same model as your friend? You might be inclined not to buy that model, even though it might be the best model for you, precisely because your friend just bought one.

I was reminded of this case while reading Dan Ariely’s excellent Predictably Irrational. His example of ordering beer demonstrates the phenomenon at work. It turns out that when ordering out loud people in a group opt for more variety, not less. Ariely suggests that this is because people need to choose something different to show they have a mind of their own, that their order conveys individuality, or perhaps that they are trying to impress.

This might mean that people order beer they don’t actually want to drink. Irrational maybe, but experimentally validated.

The really interesting part is that when people are allowed to order in private, by writing down their order, they order what they want.

Understanding this, from an influence viewpoint, is important:

1. People are influenced by others, but that influence may cause a decision contrary to the choices made by others;
2. People may make better (or at least more truthful) decisions by being protected from the influence of others and making their decisions in private.

This is very pertinent today of all days, as the US goes to the polls. The well-documented Bradley effect is an example of how some people will state their voting intentions in public, but vote differently when in the privacy of the polling booth. Will people who said they'll vote for Obama really vote for him?

We’ll see shortly in which direction the US public has truly been influenced.