During the 2000s and especially the 2010s, youth subcultures that were as influential as what existed during the late twentieth century became scarcer and quieter, at least in real life though not necessarily on the Internet, and more ridden with irony and self-consciousness thanks to awareness of incessant peer surveillance. Moreover, boundaries between the different youth subcultures appear to have been blurred, and nostalgic sentiments have risen. In Germany, for instance, youths seem more interested in a more mainstream lifestyle with goals such as finishing school, owning a home in the suburbs, maintaining friendships and family relationships, and stable employment rather than popular culture, glamor, or consumerism. Regardless, in twenty-first-century society, there are inevitably people who refuse to conform to the dominant culture and seek to do the exact opposite; given enough time, the anti-conformists will become more homogeneous with respect to their own subculture, making their behavior the opposite to any claims of counterculture. This synchronization occurs even if more than two choices are available, such as multiple styles of beard rather than whether or not to have a beard. Mathematician Jonathan Touboul of Brandeis University who studies how information propagation through society affects human behavior calls this the hipster effect.