Social Attractors

Are there any social attractors in complex systems? Perhaps some kind of pattern, structure or organizational form which we find in a social system again and again? A swarm can be described literally as an attractor: it attracts the members to a certain location. A regular meeting can be described as a kind of spatial attractor, too.

What is a “social attractor” ? Perhaps a macroscopic pattern of organization or special micro-macro link which arises inevitably through repeated interactions on microscopic scale. The pattern of a “social attractor” may be considered as the character of a social group (or the personality of the person who represents the group). Depending on the preferences, likes and dislikes, people are drawn to certain groups. A Wikipedia article about religiosity and intelligence says for example: “people with a low intelligence are more easily drawn toward religions, which give answers that are certain, while people with a high intelligence are more skeptical”. (There is also a passage in the bible which reads ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven’). Religions can be characterized as a kind of social attractor in many ways, they are also a basic form of social organization for societies and groups.

A group itself can be an attractor for discussions in the group. A typical attractor for discussions and conversations in social groups are common features of the members: if a few members of a group come together and start to discuss topics, they will sooner or later start discussing certain common features and properties of the group, even if they have met originally for a completely different reason, for example a birthday, a marriage, or a death of a member:

• Neighbors will discuss the neighborhood
• Employees will discuss the company
• Relatives will discuss the family

I observed this many times: no matter why the group members came together in the first place, in the end they discussed always something which they all had in common: for example the neighborhood, the company or the family. Is this just common sense or is there a deeper reason?

(The discussion photo is from Flickr User Dom Dada)