Gossip

Gossip

Reviewed by Faisal Zaidi

Everyday talk about who did what, the low-cost end of norm enforcement.

What it is

Talk about people's conduct when they are not in the room. In the account Kevin Simler and Robin Hanson give in The Elephant in the Brain, it is a cheap way for a group to share what each member has seen and to line up behind a common view, which makes it easier to hold a would-be dominant member to the group's norms.

In effect

In the article on the reverse dominance hierarchy, gossip is the thread that links the studies. It filled day talk in a comparison of Ju/'hoan conversations, and in a population model it allowed coalitions against dominant individuals.

What it does not say

It does not say that all talk about others is harmless or that it always serves a group. The conversation study describes one society and the population model is a simulation, so neither measures how far gossip shapes behaviour today.

Sources

  1. Simler, K., & Hanson, R. The Elephant in the Brain.
  2. Wiessner, P. W. (2014). Embers of society: Firelight talk among the Ju/'hoansi Bushmen. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
  3. Calmettes, G., & Weiss, J. N. (2017). The emergence of egalitarianism in a model of early human societies. Heliyon.