Women are more aware than men of major events in the lives of people who are close to them.
Previous research has found that women tend to be more aware of the life events of people in their social network than are men.24 When we compared men and women based on the average number of life events that someone in their social network had experienced in the past year, women were consistently more aware than men, although the average was only statistically significant for close relationships.
More educated and younger people are more aware of events in other people’s lives.
A number of demographic factors were consistently related to a higher level of awareness of major events within people’s social networks. For both men and women, those who were younger and those with more years of education tended to know of more major events in the lives of people around them.
In addition, we found that women who were married or living with a partner, and women employed in paid work outside the home, were more aware of events in the lives of their acquaintances (weak ties), but that this was not related to awareness of events in the lives of close friends and family.
Social Media Users Are More Aware of Major Events in the Lives of People Close to Them
Social media use is clearly linked to awareness of major events in other people’s lives. However, the specific technologies that are associated with awareness vary for men and women.
Among both men and women, Pinterest users have a higher level of awareness of events in the lives of close friends and family. The more frequently someone used Pinterest, the more events they were aware of:
- Compared with a woman who does not use Pinterest, a woman who visits Pinterest 18 days per month (average for a female Pinterest user) is typically aware of 8% more major life events from the 12 events we studied amongst her closest social ties.
- Compared with a man who does not use Pinterest, a man who used Pinterest at a similar rate (18 days per month) would tend to be aware of 29% more major life events amongst their closest ties.
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