Yet it is precisely these non-celebrity influentials who, according to the two-step-flow theory, are supposed to drive social epidemics, by influencing their friends and colleagues directly.

　　【长难句分析图解】

　　篇章超精读

　　①The researchers' argument stems from a simple observing about social influence: With the exception of a few celebrities like Oprah Winfrey—whose outsize presence is primarily a function of media, not interpersonal, influence—even the most influential members of a population simply don't interact with that many others.

　　②Yet it is precisely these non-celebrity influentials who, according to the two-step-flow theory, are supposed to drive social epidemics, by influencing their friends and colleagues directly.

　　③For a social epidemic to occur, however, each person so affected, must then influence his or her own acquaintances, who must in turn influence theirs, and so on;

　　④and just how many others pay attention to each of these people has little to do with the initial influential.

　　⑤If people in the network just two degrees removed from the initial influential prove resistant, for example, the cascade of change won't propagate very far or affect many people.

　　参考译文

　　①研究者的论据来源于对社会影响的一项简单观察：除了一小部分名人——比如奥普拉·温弗瑞，她的超凡形象主要是媒体的作用，而不是个人交际关系的作用——即使某个群体中最有影响力的人，他们的交流范围也不是那么大。

　　②而根据两级流动理论,恰恰是这些名不见经传的有影响力人士通过直接影响他们的朋友和同事，推动了社会流行潮。

　　③但是，要是出现某种社会潮流，每个被如此影响的人必须接着影响他的朋友，而这些被影响的人必须反过来影响他们认识的人，如此循环下去。

　　④其他人中有多少人注意到这些人，与最初的“影响者”毫无关系。

　　⑤举个例子来说，在这个人际影响的网络中，如果第一个影响者受到两次抵制，那么他的连锁影响范围就不会继续扩大，或者说影响的人不会很多。