Uh-Oh: Facebook Data Says We’re Entering Breakup Season

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Facebook’s dataset is fast becoming one of the premiere probes of human behavior. Using the site’s statistics, we can double-check our intuitions about how people, in aggregate, behave.

And so it’s with great sadness that I inform you that breakup season has begun, according to this graph from David McCandless, scraped from 10,000 status updates on the site. Right at the beginning of November, breakups start climbing, peaking a couple of weeks before Christmas.

Obviously, all sorts of caveats, selection biases, etc. But remember, this is just the beginning. Putting our social lives online means allowing our social lives to be quantified. Just look at all the analysis the dating site OKCupid puts out about our relationship predilections.

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