The Tipping Point and Dunbar's Number

At some point in our last class on Tuesday, October 3rd, one of the topics in the discussion was the Law of 800. The idea was that there was a theoretical number in which societal groups begin to break apart due to the lack of closeness or meaningful interaction between individuals which leads to fracturing of the group.

800 seemed way too high and that there was not a law of 800 as such. I knew that was incorrect but I did know that there was a theoretical number that dealt with this issue. I knew that I had read about it quite recently as well and this was what it was referring to. It took me a couple of minutes to place myself in front of the page and remember where I had seen it and of course I missed the next 5 minutes of discussion thinking about it. Then I remembered.

I had read Malcolm Gladwell's book, The Tipping Point, and seen it in the pages. By the way, the book is a fantastic read and one of the most interesting and thought-provoking books I have read to date. In it he mentions the Rule of 150, the number in which meaningful interactions and social belonging becomes fractured. This leads to separation and splintering of the larger group. It is proposed that an individual is unable to sustain meaningful enough closeness with people beyond 150. This is known as Dunbar's Number, the Magic Number 150. The research behind Dunbar's number suggests an individual can only have genuine social relationships with 150 people. Likewise, groups larger than 150 are prone to fragmentation, and it is often best for the group's health that it split. Most hunter-gatherer villages and military companies try to stay just below the 150 number, sometimes unintentionally or intentionally.

Gladwell was referring to Dunbar's Number or Dunbar's Theory, named after British anthropologist Robin Dunbar who proposed it as a measures of the "cognitive limit to the number of individuals with whom any one person can maintain stable relationships". The number is based on the limit of neo-cortex size and then determines group size. He proposed that the limit for the human species as we know it is 150.

That also got me thinking that maybe there is a "Dunbar's Number" equivalent for determining the maximum class size in a teaching environment where attention to individual and group learning is manageable or effective. After that number, the environment significantly limits the types or quality of interactions between teachers and students as well as students with each other.

We are faced often with class sizes that are overwhelming. For instance, at the beginning of this school year, I was faced with a class sizes of 35+ at the Grade 8 level. This was extremely difficult with at least three difficult constraints: Time, Space, and Learning Needs. Thankfully we were able to make adjustments within the school as a whole and the problem has been alleviated with class sizes at Grade 8 of about 25. It has made such a significant difference in the attitude and environment in the class for both teacher and student. I'm not sure what research has been done in this area but it will certainly be worth a look. It may even turn into an opportunity for a thesis project. Very intriguing idea that I may need to explore.