Important Matters in Political Context

Byungkyu Lee, Peter Bearman

Sociological Science, January 3, 2017
DOI 10.15195/v4.a1

The 2004 General Social Survey (GSS) reported significant increases in social isolation and significant decreases in ego network size relative to previous periods. These results have been repeatedly challenged. Critics have argued that malfeasant interviewers, coding errors, or training effects lie behind these results. While each critique has some merit, none precisely identify the cause of decreased ego network size. In this article, we show that it matters that the 2004 GSS—unlike other GSS surveys—was fielded during a highly polarized election period. We find that the difference in network size between nonpartisan and partisan voters in the 2004 GSS is larger than in all other GSS surveys. We further discover that core discussion network size decreases precipitously in the period immediately around the first (2004) presidential debate, suggesting that the debate frames “important matters” as political matters. This political priming effect is stronger where geographic polarization is weaker and among those who are politically interested and talk about politics more often. Combined, these findings identify the specific mechanism for the reported decline in network size, indicate that inferences about increased social isolation in America arising from the 2004 GSS are unwarranted, and suggest the emergence of increased political isolation.

Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Byungkyu Lee: Department of Sociology, Columbia University
Email: bl2474@columbia.edu

Peter Bearman: INCITE, Columbia University
Email: psb17@columbia.edu

Acknowledgements: We benefitted from comments from Delia Baldassarri, Philipp Brandt, Hannah Bruckner, Wooseok Jung, Shamus Khan, Dohoon Lee, Kinga Makovi, James Moody, Chris Muller, Barum Park, Adam Reich, Eun Kyong Shin, Yunkyu Sohn, and Robb Willer. An earlier version of this article was presented at the 9th International Network of Analytical Sociology conference. Support from the Interdisciplinary Center for Innovative Theory and Empirics (INCITE) at Columbia University is gratefully acknowledged. Please direct all correspondence to Peter Bearman (psb17@columbia.edu). Replication materials to reproduce all Figures and Tables are available at https://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataverse/bk.



  • Citation: Lee, Byungkyu, and Peter Bearman. 2017. “Important Matters in Political Context.” Sociological Science 4: 1-30.
  • Received: October 23, 2016
  • Accepted: October 26, 2016
  • Editors: Jesper Sørensen, Olav Sorenson
  • DOI: 10.15195/v4.a1


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