Rapleaf study of friends — full data

This is an interesting study we did last month about where people’s friend data comes from and how it relates to gender.

                              Friends of Men vs. Women on Social Networks

                              Men tend to be more transactional and less relationship building
when it comes to their friends on social networks. Women tend to have
slightly more friends on average.
  
In the largest social networking study ever done, Rapleaf sampled over
30 million people looking at social graph information across various
social networks including Bebo, Facebook, Friendster, Hi5, LiveJournal,
Myspace, Flickr, and others. We looked at the number of friends that
women have vs. men across these social networks. The following are
highlights of the information we extracted:
   
                              – Rapleaf sampled 30.74 million people with at least 1 friend

                              – Of the people with at least 1 friend, 53.57% are female and 46.43% are male

                              – Social Networkers (1-100 friends):

  • ~80% of the sample set
  • Women have on average 62 friends
  • Men have on average 57 friends
  • Women are more likely to be Social Networkers

                              – Connectors (100-1000 friends):

  • ~19% of the sample set
  • Women have on average 185 friends
  • Men have on average 172 friends
  • Women are more likely to be Connectors

– Super Connectors (1000-10000 friends):

  • 0.66% of the sample set
  • Women have on average 1,837 friends
  • Men have on average 1,944 friends
  • Men are more like to be Super Connectors

– Uber Connectors (10000+ friends)

  • 0.02% of the sample set
  • Women have on average 24,077 friends
  • Men have on average 24,584 friends
  • Men are more likely to be Uber Connectors

                              

  
                              Our analysis:
                               
                              As per Rapleaf’s original study [link],
women spend more time on social networks. While the full data below
demonstrates that women do have slightly more friends than men on
social networks, the difference isn’t substantial.

While we theorize that women spend more time on social networks,
building and nurturing relationships, we also theorize that men are
less likely to spend as much time nurturing relationships as they are
acquiring relationships from a transactional standpoint. Spending less
time on a social network but transacting more equates to having roughly
the same number of friends as women, who spend more time on social
networks, but are busier sustaining relationships.
                                
Full in-depth report:
 

   

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

  Women Men
  Count % Avg. Count % Avg.
1 friend 3,477,849 21.12%   3,139,918 22.00%  
2-5 friends 3,127,321 18.99%   2,904,458 20.35%  
6-10 friends 1,506,900 9.15%   1,306,375 9.15%  
11-20 friends 1,452,552 8.82%   1,266,455 8.87%  
21-30 friends 809,235 4.91%   703,960 4.93%  
31-40 friends 583,339 3.54%   499,574 3.50%  
41-50 friends 469,606 2.85%   396,328 2.78%  
50-100 friends 1,593,346 9.68%   1,303,557 9.13%  
100-1,000 friends 3,336,626 20.26%   2,655,297 18.60%  
             
1-100 friends (Social Networkers) 13,020,148 79.07% 62 11,520,625 80.72% 57
101-1,000 friends (Connectors) 3,336,626 20.26% 185 2,655,297 18.60% 172
1,001-10,000 friends (Super Connectors) 107,062 0.65% 1,837 93,676 0.66% 1,944
10,000+ friends (Uber Connectors) 1,989 0.01% 24,077 2,371 0.02% 24,584
             
At least 1 friend 16,465,825 100.00% 81 14,271,969 100.00% 78

                         

 

                              


some of the places that wrote about this report include:

                           

                           

                         

 

                           

                           

                           

                         

                           

                           

                           

                         

                           

                           

                           

                         

                           

                           

                           

                         

                           

                           

                           

                         

                           

                           

                           

                         

                           

                           

                           

                         

 

                           

                           

May 7, 2008 – Men and Women Differ on Social Networks (eMarketer)

 
 

May 5, 2008 – More Women Than Men on Social Networks, Have More Friends Than Men Do (MarketingVOX)

 
 

May 5, 2008 – Rapleaf: More Men are Uber Connectors (BizReport)

 
 

May 5, 2008 – Women Make More Friends On Social Network (WebProNews)

 
 

May 4, 2008 – Study: Men More Likely to Use Social Networking for Business (Ars Technica)

 
 

May 2, 2008 – More Women Than Men on Social Networks, Have More Friends Than Men Do (Marketing Charts)

 
 

May 2, 2008 – Women Like to Socialize but Men are All Business on Social Networks (All Things Digital)

 
 

May 1, 2008 – Women Like to Socialize but Men are All Business on Social Networks (The Industry Standard)

 
 

May 1, 2008 – Women Like to Socialize but Men are All Business on Social Networks (VentureBeat)

1 thought on “Rapleaf study of friends — full data

  1. Patricia Appelquist

    Somehow I am willing to credit your nerdy instincts, but what somehow gets under my skin, you have profiled me from basic information and that just is making me a little more paranoid.
    I wonder if someone was to look in Rapleaf computers would there folders with our names on it??
    Then I realize Rapleaf isn’t the only company that does this, then I stop thinking about it because this information like the %’s given for the next earthquake is just that, information that will eventually find it’s way into a high school student’s report on the idea of probability and profiling.

    Reply

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