Small towns breed more diverse friendships, research suggests

According to a new study by researchers from Wellesley College and the University of Kansas, the size of a community influences the scope of friendships. The study was done on college campuses, but  Julie Ardery (right) of the Daily Yonder writes that it matches her experience in small and large towns in Texas. The smaller the town, the broader a person's criteria for friend selection, and the more diverse their friends, she says. In other words, people in small and rural towns are more likely to form friendships with people less like themselves, contradicting the belief that small towns suppress diversity.

The researchers call the study of these relationships "social ecology." To test their hypothesis, researchers compared friendships of college students at the University of Kansas with those at four smaller colleges in eastern and central Kansas. They handed out surveys to pairs of students they found in public places that asked about their attitudes concerning various social issues. Researchers then looked at similarities between the friends at all schools and concluded that because people at larger universities are able to "choose among greater variety, they will also be able to match their interests and activities to partners more closely" than people at smaller schools. They hypothesized: "Greater human diversity within an environment will lead to less personal diversity within" human pairs.

Ardery writes that social ecology is an exciting field of research that is "of special interest to those of us trying to understand what, for good and ill, characterizes life in rural places." She makes her own observations from life in Smithville, Tex., where everyone "assumed diverse roles and dual occupations" that were both seen as legitimate by locals. She wonders if social ecology of small communities leads to greater inner diversity. "With many roles to fill and fewer people to assume them, small towns may tolerate or actually encourage dual working identities, even when such identities clash." (Read more)

Ardery's piece directly relates to the excellent book published in 2008 by her husband, Bill Bishop: The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded America is Tearing us Apart. The introduction of the book describes how Ardery and Bishop picked a neighborhood in Austin, Tex., "filled with Democrats" like themselves without even trying. The book explains how and why millions more Americans have done likewise.