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Social Network Analysis. Song Yang
Читать онлайн.Название Social Network Analysis
Год выпуска 0
isbn 9781506389295
Автор произведения Song Yang
Жанр Социология
Серия Quantitative Applications in the Social Sciences
Издательство Ingram
The simplest level is the egocentric network, consisting of one actor (ego) and all other actors (alters) with which ego has direct relations as well as the direct relations among those alters. This set is also called ego’s ‘‘first zone,’’ in contrast to second and higher zones consisting of all the alters of ego’s alters, and so on. If a network’s size is N actors, an egocentric analysis would have N units of analysis. Each ego actor can, in turn, be described by the number, intensity, and other characteristics of its linkages with its set of alters, for example, the proportion of reciprocated relations or the density of ties among its alters. An egocentric analysis of incarcerated California youths indicated that respondents reporting no close friendships within the facility had lower postinterview misconduct than those who nominated peers, suggesting an influence or amplifying effect of friends on misbehavior (Reid, 2017). In some respects, egocentric analysis resembles typical attribute-based survey research, with a respondent’s individual characteristics such as gender, age, and education supplemented by measures derived from that person’s direct network relations. Egocentric network research designs are well suited to surveys of respondents who are unlikely to have any contact with one another. The 1985 General Social Survey of the adult U.S. population (Marsden, 1987) pioneered procedures for identifying and eliciting information about a respondent’s alters, which we describe in some detail in Chapter 3.
A second level of analysis is the dyadic network, consisting of pairs of actors. If the order of a pair is irrelevant—as in marital status where persons are either unmarried, cohabiting, married, separated, or divorced—a sample of N actors has (N2 – N)/2 dyadic units of analysis. But, if the direction of a relation matters, as in giving orders and taking advice, then the sample contains (N2 – N) ordered dyads. The most basic questions about a dyad are whether a specific type of tie exists between two actors, and, if so, what is the intensity, duration, or strength of that relation? A closely related issue is whether a dyad without a direct tie is nevertheless indirectly connected via ties to intermediaries (e.g., brokers, go-betweens). Typical analyses seek to explain variation in dyadic relations as a function of pair characteristics, for example, the homophily hypothesis that ‘‘birds of a feather flock together’’ or the complementarity hypothesis that ‘‘opposites attract.’’ Dyadic empathy—‘‘a combination of perspective taking and empathic concerns for one’s romantic partner”—is associated with higher sexual satisfaction, relationship adjustment, and sexual desire of first-time parents (Rosen, Mooney, & Muise, 2017, p. 543).
A third level of network analysis is, unsurprisingly, triadic relations. A set of N actors has triples, the number of ways to take N actors, three at a time. All possible combinations of present and absent directed binary relations among the actors in a triple generates a set of 16 distinct triad types. A basic descriptive question for empirical network analysis regards the distribution of observed triads among the 16 types, a summary tabulation called the triad census. Substantive research on triadic structures concentrated on sentiment ties (liking, friendship, antagonism), with particular interest in balanced and transitive triadic relations (e.g., if A chooses B and B chooses C, does A tend to choose C?). Because we lack space to review triad analysis methods, interested readers should consult the research program of James Davis, Paul Holland, and Samuel Leinhardt (Davis, 1979) and a comprehensive treatment by Wasserman and Faust (1994, pp. 556–602) for details.
Beyond the three microlevels, the whole network (also called complete network) is the most important macrolevel of analysis. Researchers use the information about every relation among all N actors to represent and explain an entire network’s structural relations. Typical concerns are the presence of distinct positions or social roles within the system that are jointly occupied by the network actors and the pattern of ties within and among those positions. Although a whole network has N actors and (N2 – N) dyads (assuming directed relations and self-relations are generally ignored), these elements add up only to a single system. Examining the causes or consequences of structural variation at the whole network level of analysis typically involves measures of the global structural properties. An example is a Dutch online social network of more than 10 million users living in 438 municipalities (Norbutas & Corten, 2018). Communities with higher network diversity were more economically prosperous than less-diverse communities, whereas greater network density at the community level was negatively associated with prosperity.
The four levels of network analysis imply that emergent phenomena at one level cannot be simply deduced from knowledge of the relations at other levels. For example, transitivity of choice relations is a substantively important variable for theories of friendship formation (‘‘a friend of my friend is my friend’’), which can be observed at the triadic level but not at the egocentric or dyadic level. For another illustration, Mark Newman (2001) found that coauthorship networks in biomedical research, physics, and computer science were each structured as “small worlds,” where only five or six steps were necessary to connect random pairs of scientists. However, biomedical research was dominated by many people with few coauthors, in contrast to other disciplines characterized by a few people with many collaborators (see also, e.g., Ebadi & Schiffauerova, 2016; Maggioni, Breschi, & Panzarasa, 2013). The adaptability of network principles and procedures to investigate structural relations across multiple levels of analysis underlies its bourgeoning popularity for theorizing about social action and guiding empirical research.
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