Majority Illusion
The phenomenon where individuals systematically overestimate the prevalence of their current state (neighborhood, local environment) over the global knowledge of the states of others, which may accelerate the spread of choices, risky behaviors, social contagions.
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Origin
Introduced in 2015 by network scientists Kristina Lerman, Xiaoran Yan, and Xin-Zeng Wu from the USC Information Sciences Institute in their paper "The Majority Illusion in Social Networks," published in PLOS ONE in February 2016. They demonstrated how network structure can make locally rare behaviors appear common due to the friendship paradox, with the effect intensified in networks showing heterogeneous degree distribution.
Updated February 22, 2026