Sociology 598: Advanced Social Network Analysis

This seminar will provide graduate students an introduction to social network analysis. It is meant to be taken as a supplement to Sociology 323: Social Networks. That is, in addition to the readings and assignments described here, students will be expected to do all the readings and attend all the lectures for Sociology 323.

Grades will be based on class participation, three short response papers (2-3 pages), and a final paper or project. The response papers should address the readings of the week and students should view them as a chance to play with the ideas in the readings: look for contradictions, establish connections to your own research, develop empirical tests, etc. The response papers should not be simple summaries of the readings. Students can choose the three weeks to which they would like to respond, and all papers should be sent to me by Tuesday at midnight on the day preceding the lecture.

1. Introduction and more on the small world problem

• Travers, J. and Milgram, S. (1969). An experimental study of the small world problem. Sociometry, 32(4):425-443.
• Korte C. and Milgram, S. (1970). Acquaintance networks between racial groups: Application of the small world method. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 15(2):101-108.
• Weimann, G. (1983). The not-so-small world: Ethnicity and acquaintance networks in Israel. Social Networks, 5:282-302.

2. Random graphs to quantify local and global structure

• Holland, P.W. and Leinhardt, S. (1976). Local structure in social networks. Sociological Methodology, 7:1-45. [skim]
• Milo, R. et al. (2002). Network motifs: Simple building blocks for complex networks. Science, 298:824-827.
• Artzy-Randrup, et al. (2004). Comment on "Network motifs: Simple Building Blocks of Complex Networks" and "Superfamilies of Evolved and Designed Networks." Science, 305:1107c.
• Milo, R. et al. (2004). Response to comment on "Network motifs: Simple Building Blocks of Complex Networks" and "Superfamilies of Evolved and Designed Networks." Science, 305:1107d.
• Baldassarri, D. and Diani, M. (2007). The integrative power of civic networks. American Journal of Sociology, 113(3):735-780.

3. The consequences of degree distributions for dynamics on networks

• Ohtsuki, H. et al. (2006). A simple rule for the evolution of cooperation on graphs and social networks. Nature, 441:502-505.
• Pastor-Satorras, R. and Vespignani, A. (2001). Epidemic spreading in scale-free networks. Physical Review Letters, 86:3200-3203.
• Hamilton, D.T., Handcock, M.S., Morris, M. (2008). Degree distributions in sexual networks: A framework for evaluating evidence. Sexually Transmitted Diseases 35(1):30-40. [available from blackboard]

4. Other perspectives on search

• Rees, A. (1966). Information network in labor markets. American Economic Review, 56:559-566.
• Holzer, H.J. (1987). Informal job search and black youth unemployment. American Economic Review, 77:446-452.
• Reinggen, P.H. and Kernan, J.B. (1986). Analysis of referral networks in marketing: Methods and illustrations. Journal of Marketing Research, 23:370-278.
• Adamic, L.A. et al. (2001). Search in power-law networks. Physical Review E, 64:046135.
• Simsek, O. and Jensen, D. (2008). . PNAS, 105(35):12758-12762.

5. Spread of disease in networks

• Morris, M., Goodreau S., and Moody, J. (2007). Sexual networks, concurrency, and STD/HIV. in Sexually Transmitted Diseases (4th edition) eds. Holmes, KK et al., New York: McGraw-Hill. [available from blackboard]
• Laumann, E.O. and Youm, Y. (1999). Racial/ethnic group differences in the prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases in the United States: A network explanation. Sexually Transmitted Disease, 26:(5):250-261. [available from blackboard]
• Aral, S.O. (1999). Sexual network patterns as determinants of STD rates: paradigm shift in the behavioral epidemiology of STDs made visible. Sexually Transmitted Disease, 26:(5):262-264. [available from blackboard]
• Dezso, Z. and Barabasi, A.L. (2002). Halting viruses in scale-free networks. Physical Review E, 65:055103-1.

6. Social contagion

• Dodds, P.S. and Watts, D.J. (2004). Universal behavior in a generalized model of contagion. Physical Review Letters, 92(21):218701.
• Hedstrom, P., Sandell, R. and Stern, C. (2000) Mesolevel networks and the diffusion of social movements: The case of the Swedish Social Democratic Party. American Journal of Sociology, 106(1):145-172.
• Centola, D. and Macy, M.W. (2007). Complex contagion and the weakness of long ties. American Journal of Sociology, 113(3):702-734.

7. Social networks and health

• Smith, K.P. and Christakis, N.A. (2008). Social networks and health. Annual Review of Sociology, 34:405-429.
• Christakis, N.A. and Fowler, J.H. (2008). The collective dynamics of smoking in a large social network. New England Journal of Medicine, 358(21):2249-2258.
• Cohen, S. et al. (1997). Social ties and susceptibility to the common cold. Journal of the American Medical Association, 277(24):1940-1944 with comment and reply. [available from blackboard]

8. Sampling

• Goel, S. and Salganik, M.J. (2008). Respondent-driven sampling as Markov-chain Monte Carlo. Working paper. [available from blackboard]
• Scott, G. (2007). "They got their program and I got mine":a cautionary tale concerning the ethical implications of using respondent-driven sampling to study injection drug users. International Journal of Drug Policy, 19(1):42-51.
• With: comment, comment, comment, comment, and rejoinder.
• Johnston, L.G. et al. (2008). Implementation challenges to using respondent-driven sampling methodology for HIV biological and behavioral surveillance: Field experiences in international settings. AIDS and Behavior, S131-S141.

9. Diffusion of innovations

• Rogers, E.M. (2003). Diffusion of innovations (5th edition), New York:Free Press: Chapters 1 and 3. [available from blackboard]
• Valente, T.W. (2005). Network models and methods for studying the diffusion of innovations in Models and Methods in Social Network Analysis Cambridge:Cambridge University Press. [available from blackboard]

10. Strength of weak ties

• Granovetter, M. (1983). The strength of weak ties: A network theory revisited. Sociological Theory, 1:201-233.
• Marsden, P.V. and Campbell, K.E. (1984) Measuring ties strength. Social Forces, 63(2):482-501.
• Granovetter, M. (1994). Getting a job: A study of contacts and careers, Chicago: University of Chicago Press: Afterword. [available from blackboard]

11. Structural holes, closure, and social capital

• Portes, A. (1998). Social capital: Its origins and applications in modern sociology. Annual Review of Sociology, 24:1-24.
• Durlauf, S.N. (2002). Bowling Alone: A review essay. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 47:259-273.
• Burt, R.S. (2004). Structural holes and good ideas. American Journal of Sociology, 110(2):349-399.

12. Interactions and digital traces

• Moody, J. (2002). The importance of relationship timing for diffusion: Indirect connectivity and STD infection risk. Social Forces, 81:25-56.
• G. Kossinets, J. Kleinberg, and D.J. Watts. (2008). The structure of information pathways in a social communication network. Proc. 14th ACM SIGKDD Intl. Conf. on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining.
• Backstrom, L., Dwork, C. and Kleinberg, J. (2007). Where are thou R3579X? Anonymoized social networks, hidden patterns, and structural steganography. Proc. of 16th conference on World Wide Web. [skim]