Recently, while hanging out with my lover, who certainly qualifies as one of my 150+ stable social relationships, she told me that she heard that any one person can only have 150 meaningful relationships. She continued her statement with: "if this is true, you're effed!":)
Anyways, I looked it up:)
Per wikipedia: Dunbar's number is a suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships. These are relationships in which an individual knows who each person is, and how each person relates to every other person. No precise value has been proposed for Dunbar's number. It has been proposed to lie between 100 and 230, with a commonly used value of 150.
Ok, so hmmm, 150. I'm going to base my experiment on a 2 week period of interaction via telephone, text, email, face to face or private messaging. Not, scroll through, read the first sentence of your rant and become instantly annoyed with your complaining and move on type of interaction. Not simply "good morning" at church, but actual interaction, on a regular basis.
I've had my phone for almost 2 weeks now (YAY!! I LOVE MY NEW PHONE:)). I have messages from 70 different friends. If you include my call history, there are another 10/15 that are not included in the text number first mentioned. 5 co-workers. 5/8 regular Bible Study attendees. 10/15 church friends that I talk to outside of church on a regular basis. 5 friends that I sit with each Monday at gymnastics. 15 family members that I talk to at least every two weeks. 5 out of state phone buddies that I bitch about life to on my commute to and from work. Well, what about all the kids in my life, do I count them? If you count my 10 closest friends, that adds about 25 kids to the mix. What about the kids I force to talk to me every Sunday, add another 5 to the mix.
I reached the magic number 150 pretty easily and I didn't really have to exercise my brain. That's without looking at facebook (and we all know how I LOVE to fb;)) or my friends' family that I love and care for. Or how about my extended family? Or friends that I'm closer to during soccer or softball or volleyball? What about the friends that you don't talk to forever and then pick up right where you left off? Oh, that doesn't include my own husband and monsters;)
I think it's certainly possible to maintain more that 150 stable relationships at once. Sometimes that means that you will be exhausted and might not want to attend a birthday party or a baby shower, but you do it anyways. Or heaven forbid, you might not want to visit with your very own family at the end of a long weekend, but you can't tell them no!
It's certainly not for everyone, but it's possible.
What do you think? Do you agree with Dunbar or do you have space in your heart for more than 150 people?
PS: I completely understand the need to recharge and this is probably why I'm not actually "Effed"...even though I maintain more than 150 meaningful relationships. I snuck a vacation day in today because I needed to recharge and reconnect. I didn't tell any of my friends or family until that day that I was taking off to spend time with them. I didn't make a million different plans. I didn't play on my cool new phone. I waited until everyone was sleeping to write. I simply focused on the relationships that are most important to me and I'm pretty sure they enjoyed my surprise vacation day as much as I did:)
PPS: My lover and her family (even though she doesn't particularly want to try to disprove Dunbar's number) could use some prayers. Since I love her, I'm more than willing to share my prayer warriors, (you know, the more than 150 of you that click on the blog when I post it to facebook;)). Please pray for her aunts and uncles as they fight the super yucky diseases they are up against.
PPPS: I could use a few more prayers while we're on the subject! For a few children that I know dealing with tough family lives...and a few more for a facebook friend that is living her life here while her husband serves out his 39 weeks of service in foreign territory (praying nightly, Becky!).
When you need prayers, it's wonderful to know that you have more 150 meaningful prayers coming your way;)
PPPPS: Funny post about another persons attempt to disprove Dunbar's number (he failed...and I'm sure I would too if I tried his experiment:))
http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/03/dunbars-number-facebook/
Anyways, I looked it up:)
Per wikipedia: Dunbar's number is a suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships. These are relationships in which an individual knows who each person is, and how each person relates to every other person. No precise value has been proposed for Dunbar's number. It has been proposed to lie between 100 and 230, with a commonly used value of 150.
Ok, so hmmm, 150. I'm going to base my experiment on a 2 week period of interaction via telephone, text, email, face to face or private messaging. Not, scroll through, read the first sentence of your rant and become instantly annoyed with your complaining and move on type of interaction. Not simply "good morning" at church, but actual interaction, on a regular basis.
I've had my phone for almost 2 weeks now (YAY!! I LOVE MY NEW PHONE:)). I have messages from 70 different friends. If you include my call history, there are another 10/15 that are not included in the text number first mentioned. 5 co-workers. 5/8 regular Bible Study attendees. 10/15 church friends that I talk to outside of church on a regular basis. 5 friends that I sit with each Monday at gymnastics. 15 family members that I talk to at least every two weeks. 5 out of state phone buddies that I bitch about life to on my commute to and from work. Well, what about all the kids in my life, do I count them? If you count my 10 closest friends, that adds about 25 kids to the mix. What about the kids I force to talk to me every Sunday, add another 5 to the mix.
I reached the magic number 150 pretty easily and I didn't really have to exercise my brain. That's without looking at facebook (and we all know how I LOVE to fb;)) or my friends' family that I love and care for. Or how about my extended family? Or friends that I'm closer to during soccer or softball or volleyball? What about the friends that you don't talk to forever and then pick up right where you left off? Oh, that doesn't include my own husband and monsters;)
I think it's certainly possible to maintain more that 150 stable relationships at once. Sometimes that means that you will be exhausted and might not want to attend a birthday party or a baby shower, but you do it anyways. Or heaven forbid, you might not want to visit with your very own family at the end of a long weekend, but you can't tell them no!
It's certainly not for everyone, but it's possible.
What do you think? Do you agree with Dunbar or do you have space in your heart for more than 150 people?
PS: I completely understand the need to recharge and this is probably why I'm not actually "Effed"...even though I maintain more than 150 meaningful relationships. I snuck a vacation day in today because I needed to recharge and reconnect. I didn't tell any of my friends or family until that day that I was taking off to spend time with them. I didn't make a million different plans. I didn't play on my cool new phone. I waited until everyone was sleeping to write. I simply focused on the relationships that are most important to me and I'm pretty sure they enjoyed my surprise vacation day as much as I did:)
PPS: My lover and her family (even though she doesn't particularly want to try to disprove Dunbar's number) could use some prayers. Since I love her, I'm more than willing to share my prayer warriors, (you know, the more than 150 of you that click on the blog when I post it to facebook;)). Please pray for her aunts and uncles as they fight the super yucky diseases they are up against.
PPPS: I could use a few more prayers while we're on the subject! For a few children that I know dealing with tough family lives...and a few more for a facebook friend that is living her life here while her husband serves out his 39 weeks of service in foreign territory (praying nightly, Becky!).
When you need prayers, it's wonderful to know that you have more 150 meaningful prayers coming your way;)
PPPPS: Funny post about another persons attempt to disprove Dunbar's number (he failed...and I'm sure I would too if I tried his experiment:))
http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/03/dunbars-number-facebook/
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