The Strength of Internet Ties (.pdf): "The connectedness that the internet and other media foster within social networks has real payoffs: People use the internet to seek out others in their network of contacts when they need help...one's personal network is the avenue for help. People you know - sometimes very well, but often not - are the conduits for getting information that adds to your ability to address a problem."
Comment: I have been talking about "the network is the learning" with connectivism for a while. Our learning and knowledge does not rest only in "our heads". It rests in the network that we create (or that we are a part of). More complete understanding of complex problems is a function of acknowledging the distributed nature of both knowledge and learning. Beyond that, the very act of learning is one of connection formation. We are not always "constructing" knowledge...but we are always connecting knowledge. It's nice to encounter resources/studies that support the notion of connectivism :).
(Thanks Terry!)