by Adam Grant
People are motivated to give to others when they identify as part of a common community. But not all individuals and groups are equally likely to attract this type of identification. There’s something else about the Freecycle community that fosters identification—and it’s a factor well understood by Adam Rifkin.
The Search for Optimal Distinctiveness
When I first met Adam Rifkin, I asked him to tell me about the most interesting contacts in his network. “One of my favorite people,” he replied, “is Adam Rifkin.”
He wasn’t talking about himself. Adam Rifkin has developed a strong connection with another man named Adam Rifkin—a Hollywood writer, director, producer, and actor who has been a major contributor to films such as Detroit Rock City and He-Man. To avoid confusion, I’ll call him Hollywood Adam, referring to his endearing doppelgänger as Panda Adam.
In 1992, when Hollywood Adam was just getting his start, Panda Adam moved to Los Angeles to start his doctoral program at Caltech. People would accidentally call Panda Adam when they were trying to reach Hollywood Adam. Panda Adam wanted to get in touch with Hollywood Adam to clear up the confusion, so he put his phone number on the Internet. For three years, no one called. In 1996, Hollywood Adam was in New York, and a friend showed him Panda Adam’s website. “I knew nothing about the Internet, and I was impressed with what he’d created. I’d been mistaken for him a number of times, so I called him right away.”
It was morning on the East Coast, and just after dawn on the West Coast. The piercing sound of a ringing phone woke a sleeping Panda Adam.
Panda Adam (groggily): “Hello?”
Hollywood Adam: “Adam Rifkin, this is Adam Rifkin.”
Panda Adam: “I’ve been waiting my whole life for this call.”
On the surface, they didn’t have much in common. As far as they could tell, they weren’t related. Panda grew up in New York; Hollywood grew up in Chicago. Panda was a software engineer; Hollywood was in film. But when they met face-to-face, they felt an instant bond. “Hollywood Adam is a fascinating character,” says Panda Adam. “His career in Hollywood and mine in Silicon Valley have had more parallels than I would have guessed. Any time somebody asks me for a connection in Hollywood, he’s usually the person I start with. Hollywood Adam has made countless introductions to help people I know. Many people in Hollywood are narcissistic and self-centered, but Hollywood Adam is as good-natured and kind as they come. We kind of have the same philosophy.”
“Panda Adam is a great guy,” says Hollywood Adam. “We have a similar sense of humor. We help each other without keeping score. Neither one of us ever gives it any thought; we just do what’s helpful.” Panda Adam was the person who introduced Hollywood Adam to Twitter. When Hollywood Adam did a series for Showtime called Look, Panda Adam invited him up to northern California to do screenings at YouTube and Twitter. Why did the two Adam Rifkins identify so strongly with each other?
If you’re thinking it’s a name similarity effect, the data suggest that you’re right—at least partially. Brett Pelham, a psychologist at the University at Buffalo, noticed that we seem to prefer people, places, and things that remind us of ourselves. Because we associate our names so strongly with our identities, we might be attracted to major decisions that remind us of our names. In an effort to demonstrate this, Pelham and his colleagues have conducted a mind-boggling, controversial set of studies.
Across five different studies, they found that people are unusually likely to end up living in places that resemble their first names. In one study, Pelham’s team searched the forty biggest cities in the United States for the one hundred most common first names that shared their first three letters with these cities. Then, they matched up names in terms of how popular they were in different age groups. It turns out that people named Jack are four times more likely than people named Phillip to live in Jacksonville, even though the names are equally common. (The Phils have apparently retreated to Philadelphia, where they outnumber the Jacks.) And it’s not that they’re named after these places; people are more likely to move to places that resemble their own names (Georgia is twice as likely to move to Georgia as chance would predict).
It works for careers too: in 1990, Dennis was the fortieth most common male first name in the United States. Jerry was the thirty-ninth, and Walter was forty-first.
There were 270 dentists in the United States named Jerry.
There were 257 dentists in the United States named Walter.
How many dentists were named Dennis?
Statistically, there should have been somewhere between 257 and 270.
In reality, there were 482.
If your name was Dennis, you were almost twice as likely to become a dentist as if you had the equally common name of Jerry or Walter. Other studies show that people with the last name Lawyer are more likely to become lawyers than doctors, at rates 44 percent higher than chance; the opposite is true for people named Doctor, at 38 percent greater than chance rates. The attraction also holds for products and people that we associate with ourselves. Pelham and colleagues have found that people prefer chocolates, crackers, and teas that include the letters of their own names—and that they’re more attracted to potential dates who have similar initials, even though they insist that this similarity doesn’t influence their attraction. And evidence shows that similarity can influence whom we decide to help. Researchers Jeff Galak, Deborah Small, and Andrew Stephen studied more than 289,000 loans to more than 23,000 borrowers on Kiva, a microfinance website where people can give loans as small as $25 to help people in the developing world escape poverty and start businesses. People were more likely to give microloans to borrowers who shared their first initials or their occupations.*
It appears that similarity to the self adds a bit of grease to the attraction process: people are just a bit more enthusiastic, friendly, and open-minded when they meet someone who reminds them of themselves. This is what happened to the two Adam Rifkins when they first met. They initially clicked based on a superficial similarity, which opened the door for them to connect based on real similarities—and start helping each other. This is not unusual; the Web is now full of “Googlegangers,” or people with the same name who have formed online groups.
But the bond between the two Adam Rifkins goes beyond the fact that they have the same name. To illustrate, imagine that you show up for a study along with a college student. A researcher takes your fingerprints, under the guise of studying whether they reveal anything about your personality. You both fill out a personality questionnaire. As you’re getting ready to leave, the student pulls out a paper from her backpack. “For an English class that I’m taking, I need to find someone I don’t know to critique my essay. I wonder if you could read this eight-page essay for me and give me one page of written feedback on whether my arguments are persuasive and why? I need the written feedback by this time tomorrow.” Would you help her?
You were just in the control group in a study led by the psychologist Jerry Burger, where 48 percent of participants helped. But other participants were led to believe that they had something in common with the student making the request. After they filled out the questionnaire, the researcher examined a fingerprint evaluation sheet and remarked, “This is interesting. You both have Type E fingerprints.”
Now, would you be more likely to help?
It depends on how the similarity was framed. Half of the time, the researcher mentioned that Type E fingerprints are common: about 80 percent of the population has them. The other half of the time, the researcher mentioned that Type E fingerprints are very rare: only about 2 percent of the population has them.
When the similarity was common, 55 percent of participants helped—hardly more than the control group. But when the similarity was rare, 82 percent of participants helped. It was not just any commonality that drove people to act like givers. It was an uncommon commonality. In Pelham’s studies, n
ame-similarity effects on where we live, what careers we choose, and whom we marry are stronger for people with rare names than common names. We gravitate toward people, places, and products with which we share an uncommon commonality. This is the bond that the two Adam Rifkins felt when they first connected. Adam Rifkin is a rare name, and the uncommon commonality may have greased the attraction process. Indeed, Pelham’s research shows that the more unique your name is, the more likely you are to identify with places that resemble your name.
To explain why uncommon commonalities are so transformative, the psychologist Marilynn Brewer developed an influential theory. On the one hand, we want to fit in: we strive for connection, cohesiveness, community, belonging, inclusion, and affiliation with others. On the other hand, we want to stand out: we search for uniqueness, differentiation, and individuality. As we navigate the social world, these two motives are often in conflict. The more strongly we affiliate with a group, the greater our risk of losing our sense of uniqueness. The more we work to distinguish ourselves from others, the greater our risk of losing our sense of belongingness.
How do we resolve this conflict? The solution is to be the same and different at the same time. Brewer calls it the principle of optimal distinctiveness: we look for ways to fit in and stand out. A popular way to achieve optimal distinctiveness is to join a unique group. Being part of a group with shared interests, identities, goals, values, skills, characteristics, or experiences gives us a sense of connection and belonging. At the same time, being part of a group that is clearly distinct from other groups gives us a sense of uniqueness. Studies show that people identify more strongly with individuals and groups that share unique similarities. The more rare a group, value, interest, skill, or experience is, the more likely it is to facilitate a bond. And research indicates that people are happier in groups that provide optimal distinctiveness, giving a sense of both inclusion and uniqueness. These are the groups in which we take the most pride, and feel the most cohesive and valued.
Freecycle initially provided a sense of optimal distinctiveness through its emphasis on protecting the environment. The central goal was different from most recycling movements: instead of reprocessing old materials into new ones, members found recipients who wanted goods that couldn’t be reprocessed, keeping them out of landfills. This common purpose created a shared identity within the Freecycle community, fostering a sense of connection across diverse ideologies. The original group of Freecycle volunteers in Tucson included a liberal Democrat who was passionate about environmental sustainability, a conservative Republican who didn’t believe in waste, and a Libertarian who wanted to empower people to do things themselves, rather than relying on governmental support. Over time, as membership expanded and diversified, each Freecycle community provided an outlet for people to customize giving to their own interests. In New York, for example, a local group made a habit of shutting down a city block for Freecycle gifting events.
By fostering a common identity and opportunities for unique self-expression, Freecycle was able to mobilize a giving system based on generalized reciprocity: you give to help others in the community, and you know that someone in the community will give to you. But Willer’s team finds that there’s a catch: such a system depends on a “critical mass of exchange benefits,” which “creates positive sentiments toward the group, sentiments that help fuel further contributions.” In other words, people only identify with a generalized giving group after they receive enough benefits to feel like the group is helping them. With Freecycle, this outcome was by no means guaranteed; after all, if the givers on the site had been overwhelmed by takers looking for a free ride, the whole thing might never have gotten off the ground. How did Freecycle accumulate that initial critical mass of giving and discourage free riding?
Why Superman Backfires and People Conserve Electricity
When Freecycle first launched, one of the early members was a ninety-eight-year-old man. He collected parts to fix up bicycles and gave them to local children. He was an “incredible role model,” Deron Beal recalls. Tucson citizens were able to identify with the man as a fellow resident. When they saw him give, he was a member of their unique community, so they felt more compelled to follow his example. New York University psychologist Jonathan Haidt refers to this as elevation, the warm feeling of being moved by others’ acts of giving, which can “seem to push a mental ‘reset button,’ wiping out feelings of cynicism and replacing them with . . . a sense of moral inspiration.” When elevated, Haidt and psychologist Sara Algoe write, “we feel as though we have become (for a moment) less selfish, and we want to act accordingly.”
But it was more than just common identity that made this elderly man such an elevating role model. Consider an experiment by psychologists Leif Nelson and Michael Norton, who randomly assigned people to list either ten features of a superhero or ten features of Superman. When invited to sign up as community service volunteers, the group that listed superhero features was nearly twice as likely to volunteer as the Superman group. Three months later, Nelson and Norton invited both groups to a meeting to kick off their volunteering. The people who had written about a superhero were four times more likely to show up than the people who had written about Superman. Thinking about a superhero three months earlier supported giving. In comparison, thinking about Superman discouraged giving. Why?
When people think about the general attributes of superheroes, they generate a list of desirable characteristics that they can relate to themselves. In the study, for example, people wrote about how superheroes are helpful and responsible, and they wanted to express these giver values, so they volunteered. But when people think specifically about Superman, what comes to mind is a set of impossible standards, like those popularized in the TV series The Adventures of Superman: “faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.” No one can be that strong or heroic, so why bother trying?
On Freecycle, givers modeled a standard that seemed attainable. When members saw a ninety-eight-year-old man building bikes for kids, they knew they could do something too. When members saw people giving away items like clothes and old electronics, they felt it would be easy for them to do the same. The small acts of giving that started on Freecycle made it easy and acceptable for other people to give small amounts. Indeed, Cialdini finds that people donate more money to charity when the phrase “even a penny will help” is added to a request. Interestingly, this phrase increases the number of people who give without necessarily decreasing the amount that they give. Legitimizing small contributions draws in takers, making it difficult and embarrassing for them to say no, without dramatically reducing the amount donated by givers.
Although most people joined Freecycle to get free stuff, this doesn’t mean that taking was their primary reciprocity style. When people join a group, they look for cues about appropriate behavior. When new Freecycle members saw similar others modeling low-cost acts of giving, it became natural for them to follow suit. By making giving visible, Freecycle made it easy for people to see the norm.
It’s a powerful lesson, even more so when we realize how much the visibility of giving can affect reciprocity styles. In many domains of life, people end up taking because they don’t have access to information about what others are doing. Just a few months after Freecycle got off the ground, Cialdini worked with a team of psychologists to survey more than eight hundred Californians about their energy consumption. They asked the Californians how important the following factors were in shaping their decisions to save energy:
It saves money
It protects the environment
It benefits society
A lot of other people are doing it
The Californians consistently reported that the most important factor was protecting the environment. Benefiting society was second, saving money was third, and following the lead of other people was last. Cialdini’s tea
m wanted to see whether people were right about their own motivations, so they designed an experiment. They visited nearly four hundred homes in San Marcos, California, and randomly assigned them to receive one of four different types of door hangers:
Save money by conserving energy: According to researchers at Cal State San Marcos, you could save up to $54 per month by using fans instead of air conditioning to keep cool in the summer.
Protect the environment by conserving energy: According to researchers at Cal State San Marcos, you can prevent the release of up to 262 lbs. of greenhouse gases per month by using fans instead of air conditioning to keep cool this summer.
Do your part to conserve energy for future generations: According to researchers at Cal State San Marcos, you can reduce your monthly demand for electricity by 29% using fans instead of air conditioning to keep cool this summer.
Join your neighbors in conserving energy: In a recent survey of households in your community, researchers at Cal State San Marcos found that 77% of San Marcos residents often use fans instead of air conditioning to keep cool in the summer.
Cialdini’s team conducted door-to-door interviews at each household, without knowing which door hangers they had. When asked how motivating the door hangers were, the residents whose hangers emphasized joining their neighbors reported the lowest motivation. They reported 18 percent lower desires to conserve energy than residents with the protect-the-environment hangers, 13 percent lower than residents with the future-generations hangers, and 6 percent lower than residents with the save-money hangers.
But when Cialdini’s team looked at the residents’ energy bills to see what people actually did, they found something surprising: the residents were wrong about what motivated them. During the following two months, the residents whose door hangers emphasized joining their neighbors actually conserved the most energy. On average, the “join your neighbors” hanger led to between 5 and 9 percent fewer daily kilowatt-hours of energy used than the other three hangers—which were all equally ineffective. Knowing that other people were conserving energy was the best way to get residents to follow suit.