At a minimum the majority of search dollars will flow to a social media model because people care most about what their peers think and the technology is there for that information to be quickly shared on products and services.
As social media is less about technology and more about relationship building, we are starting to see more women have a heavy influence if not dominant role in the social media space. It's no wonder that Facebook is being run in part by chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg.
You're talking about a younger generation, Generation Y, whose interpersonal communication skills are different from Generation X. The younger generation is more comfortable saying something through a digital mechanism than even face to face.