arbiter
JournalsPricingAccount

How Gossip Rules the World: Three Hypotheses

Nicholas Emler

Journal of Language and Social Psychology2025https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927x251315640article
AJG 2
Weight
0.41

What the paper says

The recent surge in research interest about gossip can be attributed, at least in part, to the possibility that this activity underlies two of the unique features of human society, when compared to those of all other social vertebrates, their scale and their complexity. Two hypotheses have emerged which touch on these features, respectively that gossip supports exceptional levels of sociability, and that it operates as a form of social control ensuring exceptional levels of cooperation. Each of these hypotheses is critically examined before considering a third and relatively neglected possibility, namely that the principle significance of gossip in social life is that it supports prediction about the future behavior of others.

2 citations

Open paper page →

Cite this paper

https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927x251315640

Or copy a formatted citation

@article{nicholas2025,
  title        = {{How Gossip Rules the World: Three Hypotheses}},
  author       = {Nicholas Emler},
  journal      = {Journal of Language and Social Psychology},
  year         = {2025},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/0261927x251315640},
}

Paste directly into BibTeX, Zotero, or your reference manager.

Flag this paper

How Gossip Rules the World: Three Hypotheses

Flags are reviewed by the Arbiter methodology team within 5 business days.

Evidence weight

0.41

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.25 × 0.4 = 0.10
M · momentum0.55 × 0.15 = 0.08
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.