Someone To Talk To by Mario Luis Small


Someone To Talk To
Title : Someone To Talk To
Author :
Rating :
ISBN : 0190661445
ISBN-10 : 9780190661441
Language : English
Format Type : Kindle Edition
Number of Pages : 290
Publication : Published September 27, 2017

When people are facing difficulties, they often feel the need for a confidant-a person to vent to or a sympathetic ear with whom to talk things through. How do they decide on whom to rely? In theory, the answer seems if the matter is personal, they will turn to a spouse, a family member, or someone close. In practice, what people actually do often belies these expectations.

In Someone To Talk To , Mario Luis Small follows a group of graduate students as they cope with stress, overwork, self-doubt, failure, relationships, children, health care, and poverty. He unravels how they decide whom to turn to for support. And he then confirms his findings based on representative national data on adult Americans.

Small shows that rather than consistently relying on their "strong ties," Americans often take pains to avoid close friends and family, as these relationships are both complex and fraught with expectations. In contrast, they often confide in "weak ties," as the need for understanding or empathy trumps their fear of misplaced trust. In fact, people may find themselves confiding in acquaintances and even strangers unexpectedly, without having reflected on the consequences.

Someone To Talk To reveals the often counter-intuitive nature of social support, helping us understand when people will keep depression secret from their close ones, why people may avoid reporting sexual assault, how people may decide whom to come out to, and why even competitors can be among a person's best confidants.

Amid a growing wave of big data and large-scale network analysis, Small returns to the basic questions of whom we connect with, how, and why, upending decades of conventional wisdom on how we should think about and analyze social networks.

Someone To Talk To Reviews

  • Ieva

    To live is to experience emotional difficulties. And when it happens, who do we turn to? How do we choose the people we trust? What about that random person next to you on the plane? Various behavioural psychologists have argued that our decisions are not always as rational as we think.
    This book explores the mentioned questions and supports them with research on graduate students.

  • Abel Thayil

    I enjoyed reading this book partly because of its thesis, which I was naturally inclined to believing, but mostly because it narrates every day experiences of graduate students. Being one myself, it was comforting to know that I’m not alone in having those anxieties. The author’s sympathetic tone to those problems made it as if I was listening in on a therapy session.

  • Adani

    Took a while to finish but really liked this! Lots of cool insights re: who people confide in as well as when and why, though not exactly written for a general audience

  • Grace Raper

    “Amid a growing wave of big data and large-scale network analysis, Small returns to the basic questions of whom we connect with, how, and why, upending decades of conventional wisdom on how we should think about and analyze social networks.”

    Was at times repetitive, but overall Small provides a well detailed and insightful account of his social network research that - in many ways - flips conventional wisdom on its head.

  • Lorette

    Demonstrates the importance of social support - that is, weaker ties are important in that people are more likely to share and offload with those who are not strongly connected to them, but trusted.

  • Alicia

    finally finished this... Omg it was so good

    interesting to think about how both social structure + internal state contribute to the way people interact with each other

  • Summer

    Very interesting theory, however the second part became very repetitive (although it was an important insight into his research)

  • Eduardo

    I read this book for a class in research methods I am taking in graduate school. Small puts forth interesting ideas about how we actually select the people we share with others about topics that are important to us. These ideas definitely build on research in the field of psychology and behavioral economics about decision making while seeking to change thinking about network analysis. I found the book fascinating in terms of not only the ideas but also in terms of the research itself. Small also clearly outlines his research decisions and process, which is helpful for students and other researchers. Not only has Small blazed a bit of new trail but he has also left a trail of breadcrumbs behind for the rest of us to follow.