In an attempt to create a new television sensation, and hold on to large numbers of viewers, the FOX television network aired a show entitled Unan1mous last spring, directly after its hit American Idol. This show, which borrowed elements from both Big Brother and Deal or No Deal, featured nine contestants who lived together in an underground bunker. Their sole task throughout the show was to choose which contestant to give 1.5 million dollars to. Every week contestants would vote on who to award the money to and who to eliminate from the chance to win the money. The eliminated players would remain in the bunker and were still counted towards the unanimous vote, but were no longer in the running for the prize.

There were, however, a few catches to the game. The first was that the decision needed to be unanimous, meaning that all contestants had to agree upon one person to award the prize to. The second was that the amount of money continually counted down for every second that the contestants remained in the bunker without coming to a decision. The third was that before each vote an incriminating piece of evidence was publicly announced about a few contestants. Finally, if any contestant chose to leave the bunker, and the game, the money would automatically be cut in half.

The show was filmed over five days. However, the producers had no idea how long it would take the contestants to come to a unanimous decision, and therefore were willing and able to film until a decision was reached or the money ran out. If no one had left the bunker and no decision was reached, the longest the game would have lasted was eight days. Because two players chose to leave, each cutting the pool in half, and a unanimous decision was finally reached, this game did not last the full eight days.

In class we discussed the concepts behind network exchange theory and looked at different examples of power and social exchange experiments. The social network created by this reality TV show is similar to that of “The Ultimatum Game” (if no decision is reached, everyone gets nothing). It is a lot more complicated that the networks we looked at in class but illustrates many of the same principles. Players, in this case, did not have access to full information, as they were allowed to speak to whomever they wished and in many cases were untruthful. One of the contestants chose to lie and told everyone that he had testicular cancer, in hopes that they would feel sorry for him and award him the money. In class we touched briefly on how trust plays a role in social exchange experiments.

We also looked at the Behavioral Principle in class which states that if a node is excluded, it will change what it asks for in order to get back into the game. When the voting results from the entire season of Unan1mous are examined, the majority vote went to a different contestant every round. Instead of trying to convince the few contestants who did not vote for the previous round’s majority winner, contestants picked a new recipient each vote. In hopes to succeed at the game, contestants changed their strategy every round, rather than risk voting for the same contestant they had previously voted for.

Despite the ethical debates surrounding this television show, and the poor cinematography, I find it to be an extremely good example of a social exchange network. I only wish that social scientists had examined the show in further detail because the network of power would be fascinating to graph.