Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • May–June 2019
  • Article
  • Marketing Science

U-Shaped Conformity in Online Social Networks

By: Monic Sun, Michael Zhang and Feng Zhu
  • Format:Print
ShareBar

Abstract

We explore how people balance their needs to belong and to be different from their friends by studying their choices of a virtual-house wall color on a leading Chinese social-networking site. The setting enables us to randomize both the popular color and the adoption rate at the individual level so that our experimental design minimizes informational social influence, homophily, and group-identity signaling to the general public. We find that there exists significant social influence within a user’s friend circles. While learning about the most popular color among a user’s friends generally increases the likelihood for the user to adopt that color, conformity first decreases and then increases with the adoption rate of that choice, which ranges from 50% to 100%. In addition, users who are minority, newer, or of lower social-economic status are more likely to conform upon learning about the popular choice. Our findings are consistent with optimal distinctiveness and middle-status conformity theories and have implications for designing normative marketing campaigns.

Keywords

Conformity; Normative Social Influence; Social Networks; Field Experiment; Social and Collaborative Networks; Behavior; Attitudes; Social Media

Citation

Sun, Monic, Michael Zhang, and Feng Zhu. "U-Shaped Conformity in Online Social Networks." Marketing Science 38, no. 3 (May–June 2019): 461–480.
  • Find it at Harvard
  • Read Now

About The Author

Feng Zhu

Technology and Operations Management
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • February 2022
    • Faculty Research

    Huazhu: A Chinese Hotel Giant's Journey of Digital Transformation

    By: Feng Zhu, Yulin Fang, Bonnie Yining Cao and Duan Yang
    • November 2021
    • Faculty Research

    Ant Group (B)

    By: Krishna G. Palepu, Feng Zhu and Susie L. Ma
    • November 2021 (Revised December 2021)
    • Faculty Research

    EbonyLife Media (B)

    By: Andy Wu, Feng Zhu, Pippa Tubman Armerding and Wale Lawal
More from the Authors
  • Huazhu: A Chinese Hotel Giant's Journey of Digital Transformation By: Feng Zhu, Yulin Fang, Bonnie Yining Cao and Duan Yang
  • Ant Group (B) By: Krishna G. Palepu, Feng Zhu and Susie L. Ma
  • EbonyLife Media (B) By: Andy Wu, Feng Zhu, Pippa Tubman Armerding and Wale Lawal
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College