Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Virginity rates among students by major

Today's Digg leader is a "study" of the correlation between the percentage of virgins and their college major at Wellesley College. I hesitate to proclaim this a true study, because there is literally zero supporting data presented on the page (e.g., sample size, author, etc.). At any rate, the Diggers love it, and the resulting graph is below, followed by why it works.1) Sex: Sex sells; everyone knows this. More importantly though, when it comes to Digg, sex sells if and only if it's about women. Remember, the main Digg demographic is nerdy white college-age men. They don't care about the newest cute picture of David Beckham. But show them a study of the "easiest" girls at school sorted by major, and they're gonna be sending it all the brothers at their fraternity.

2) College: Most people's first impression when they hear the word "college" is not books and studying, but beer and partying. Because beer and partying is exciting, college is exciting; people like to pass on exciting information; because college is exciting, people want to pass on information about it. You follow?

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