I’ll Be on NPR Saturday, Looking After My Dunbar Number

I’ll be on NPR’s All Things Considered this Saturday afternon as part of a short segment about “Dunbar’s number,” the vital network of 150-or-so social relations that evolutionary psychologist Robin Dunbar says we must each maintain to live successfully. (We do it mainly by talking, especially gossip; monkeys do it mainly by grooming.) I’ve written about this dynamic in two magazine features and two blog posts. An NPR producer planning a segment on Dunbar and his new book read one of those pieces and had an inspired idea. We’ll see hear tomorrow whether the idea pans out. In any case, I believe I can safely promise listeners a chicken.

Catch it at your local NPR station on Saturday, May 28, at about 5:35 pm (unless some breaking news disrupts the planned program). I’ll post a url with the show here as soon as they have one.

See Also:

  • Picking Robin Dunbar's Brain: An Interview About Friends
  • Local & Distant Friendships – A Dunbar Number Conundrum
  • Robin Dunbar
  • Topic Page for Robin Dunbar

Image: by Laertes at flickr, some rights reserved

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