NETWORKS AND BEHAVIOR

THE DYNAMICS OF NETWORKS AND BEHAVIOR

This is the site of the Research Programme Dynamics of Networks and Behavior which is a collaborative programme of the Universities of Groningen and Utrecht (graduate school ICS) and Maastricht (Department of Health Promotion and Health Education). The Research Programme is financed by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) under grant 401-01-550.

Why is it that smokers tend to have smokers as friends, and non-smokers tend to have non-smokers as friends? Do our friends influence us (and we conform), or do we select similar others as friends (because interaction with them is more rewarding)? If both processes are at work, which one is more efficient in the propagation of smoking behaviour? What type of intervention programmes will be most efficient in reducing smoking-related health risks in a population?

As the example illustrates, networks and behavior can be causally entwined in a complicated manner. The analysis of social network dynamics often confronts us with such causality problems. Not just in the propagation of health risks, but also in a host of other applications of network analysis: collective action, the emergence of group norms, information flow, or brokerage. In all these disciplines, explanatory theories involve both network influences on individual behaviour and influences of individual characteristics on network formation.

Processes of contagion, social influence, or partner selection have been suggested for modelling partial aspects of these dynamics. For the special case of ego-centered network data, in principle, structural equation models for panel designs (cross-lagged models) are available. Yet for complete networks, to our knowledge, no such methodology is available yet. This we intend to change.

The principal questions of our research programme are:

How do attitudes and behavior of individual actors influence network change?
How does network structure in turn influence the actors' behavior and attitudes?
What are consequences on the collective level of these mutual feedback processes?

Our research group will elaborate a general methodology which promises an answer to these questions, following the paradigm of purposive individual behaviour conditioned by social context. The research programme comprises two methodological and three applied projects:

Modeling the Evolution of Networks and Behavior
(postdoc project Christian Steglich, Groningen; finished),
Statistical Methods for Studying the Evolution of Networks and Behavior
(Ph.D. project Michael Schweinberger, Groningen; finished),
Emergence of Group Norms in Pupils' Networks in High Schools
(Ph.D. project Andrea Knecht, Utrecht),
Dynamics of Friendship Networks in the Process of Smoking Initiation
(Ph.D. project Liesbeth Mercken, Maastricht), and
The Dynamics of Cooperation and Networks
(postdoc project Davide Barrera, Utrecht).

A more extensive description of our research programme can be found here.

This website is meant to be a traffic junction by which online resources about the dynamics of networks and behavior can be accessed. It should provide you with tools for data analysis as well as links to webpages about related research and researchers.

In particular, we intend to share the data analytical tools which we develop. These will be implemented in the SIENA program (included in the StOCNET program package), and you will be able to access them via this website.

If you have comments or questions about this webpage, please e-mail Christian Steglich.
This page was last updated on May 10th, 2007.