Quantification of Social Behavior

Averages are wrong.   " ...  The key here is the word "average." This is quite likely the wrong way to think about social behavior.  This is actually quite common in social behavior reporting that I see online.  Take another example from Pew Research: "The average American has just over two discussion confidants (2.16) – that is, people with whom they discuss important matters. This is a modest, but significantly larger number than the average of 1.93 core ties reported when we asked this same question in 2008."  [1]  I am also guessing that the use of average here is probably wrong.  Why? ... "