#### [[Dunbar's Number]] --- > Dunbar's number is a suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships—relationships in which an individual knows who each person is and how each person relates to every other person. > This number was first proposed in the 1990s by British anthropologist [[@Robin Dunbar]], who found a correlation between primate brain size and average social group size. > By using the average human brain size and extrapolating from the results of primates, he proposed that humans can comfortably maintain 150 stable relationships. > Dunbar explained it informally as "the number of people you would not feel embarrassed about joining uninvited for a drink if you happened to bump into them in a bar." > Proponents assert that numbers larger than this generally require more restrictive rules, laws, and enforced norms to maintain a stable, cohesive group. > It has been proposed to lie between 100 and 250, with a commonly used value of 150. > <div class="signature"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar's_number">-- Wikipedia</a></div> Dunbar's number applied to a person is akin to a force directed network graph. Each person is a node in of themselves and their connections pull them to varying degrees towards other clusters of nodes (relationships). Be it Family, friend circles, coworkers, etc. The more people you have scattered about in your network the less strength there is in the edge that pulls you towards that cluster. --- Tags: [[Society]] - [[Community]] - [[Tribalism]] - [[Neurology]] - [[Psychology]] - [[Relationships]] Reference: Related: -