Mobility types,transnational ties and personal networks in four highly skilled immigrant communities in Seville (Spain)

In this study, we explore how different mobility patterns influence the composition and structure of the transnational social support networks and how personal networks allow us to elicit insightful data of mobile individuals. Ninety-five mobile individuals were selected from four distinct communities based in Seville (Spain), namely: Erasmus students, Flamenco artists, musicians from the symphonic orchestra and partners of European Commission researchers. Data were collected through an electronic survey sent by email with multiple name generators and a structured face-to-face interview utilizing a network visualization tool, VennMaker. Two distinct methods, namely qualitative case studies and cluster analysis were used to characterize mobility types. Findings reveal a heterogeneous foreign population, in which different forms of mobility are reflected in the personal networks of mobile individuals. Respondents who were settled in the city were more likely to have networks in which social support was mainly derived by hosts and people in the host location and with whom they communicated predominantly through face-to-face communication. Those who were in the host location for a study exchange, knowing that return to the county of origin is imminent were more likely to have networks linked to the home location. They relied heavily on strong transnational ties in the home country using social media to sustain their relationship. Respondents with an itinerant mobility profile, also had networks dominated by strong transnational ties, however, such ties had a higher degree of geographical spread due to previous international mobility. Participants who had a high number of hosts in the network but low connection between the ties were more likely to be linked to a specific subculture in the host society. The integration in the host location follows a different pattern to other settled individuals, mainly because their connection in the city tends to be community specific.     

Spatial distance and mobile business social network density

Following the increasing adoption of mobile communication, scholars have shown interest in the role of place on the structure of mobile social networks. The purpose of this study is to investigate the association between spatial distance and the closure and diversity of businesses mobile social networks. We used a database that aggregates actual mobile communication patterns of business users of a large Israeli cell phone company (n?= 16,199). Our findings, among a large sample of businesses, provide support for the place and mobile communication perspective. The results reveal a negative association between spatial distance and mobile business communication networks. As spatial distance between business network members increases, business social ties through mobile communication decreases. Furthermore, the results also revealed a negative association between spatial distance and mobile network density. As the spatial distance between business users increases, the density of the mobile communication network diminishes. Physical proximity promotes the development of dense business networks. The implications of the findings are discussed.     

Exploring variation in active network size: Constraints and ego characteristics

Studies of active personal networks have primarily focused on providing reliable estimates of the size of the network. In this study, we examine how compositional properties of the network and ego characteristics are related to variation in network size. There was a negative relationship between mean emotional closeness and network size, for both related and unrelated networks. Further, there was a distinct upper bound on total network size. These results suggest that there are constraints both on the absolute number of individuals that ego can maintain in the network, and also on the emotional intensity of the relationships that ego can maintain with those individuals.     

Upward contacts in everyday life: Benefits of reaching hierarchical relations in ego-centered networks

Recent studies have inspired inquiries about what circumstances allow people to gain from interactions with those who rank higher than themselves in the social hierarchy. We examine how self-reported benefits of such upward contacts vary by tie strength and network structures in everyday life. Data were drawn from contact diaries that 137 individuals recorded over seven months in 2014; these diaries captured unique features of 94,353 one-on-one contacts that 137 diary keepers made, along with the estimated tie strength and the extent of embeddedness among network members. Multilevel models with interaction terms show that diary keepers benefit from contacts with people who play higher hierarchical roles and that the benefits become more substantial when the higher-ranked others are weakly tied to the diary keepers and connected with fewer fellow network members. The paper extends contact diary studies to estimate alter-alter ties that help construct comprehensive structures in egocentric networks.     

Do women have longer conversations? Telephone evidence of gendered communication strategies

We investigate whether there are systematic gender differences in communication behavior by telephone. First, we report a study of anonymized billing records of 3103 subscribers to a large mobile operator in Italy and Greece over 2 years from 2006 to 2008. Faced with identical tariffs, women make fewer calls than men, and their calls last 16% longer controlling for other factors. Secondly, we report a study of some 92,000 person-days of calls to call-center employees of a large consumer services company operator at four sites in Germany. Calls randomly allocated to women last 15% longer than those of men controlling for other factors. There is no evidence, however, that this results in the women being any less effective employees than the men; indeed, in operations involving sales where it is possible to measure productivity by this criterion, female employees make slightly more sales per shift than men. It appears instead to reflect systematic gender differences in communication strategies, though it may reflect also an element of preference by both men and women for speaking to women. The findings of both studies are highly statistically significant and are found across all age groups. The magnitude of gender differences is sensitive to the costs of communication. The results have implications for possible explanations of gender clustering in the labor market.     

The stability of exchange networks

Economic and sociological exchange theories predict divisions of exchange benefits given an assumed fixed network of exchange relations. Since network structure has been found to have a large impact on actors’ payoffs, actors have strong incentives for network change. We answer the question what happens to both the network structure and actor payoffs when myopic actors change their links in order to maximize their payoffs. We investigate the networks that are stable, the networks that are efficient or egalitarian with varying tie costs, and the occurrence of social dilemmas. Only few networks are stable over a wide range of tie costs, and all of them can be divided into two types: efficient networks consisting of only dyads and at most one isolate, and Pareto efficient and egalitarian cycles with an odd number of actors. Social dilemmas are observed in even-sized networks at low tie costs.     

Eliciting representative samples of personal networks

In this paper we introduce and evaluate a method for eliciting a representative sample of total personal networks. First names were used as a cue to elicit a sample of 14 alters from 712 respondents through a telephone interview. Network characteristics for each respondent were calculated as averages and proportions across the 14 alters. These were compared to other studies using more specialized network generators. Our method produced results which are logically consistent with those expected from a generator that elicits a sample from the total rather than a specialized subset of the total network. The proportions of kin relations, average tie strength and frequency of contacts are found to be lower than network generators designed to elicit networks of social support. Given our conclusion that the sample is representative of the total network, we examine the varying characteristics of respondents and their networks based on the domination of a particular relation type in their network. This analysis provides answers to such questions as ‘What characteristics of respondents account for the proportion of family relations in their network?‘ and ‘What are the similarities between respondents whose networks are made up of mostly work-related relations?’     

Social networks and Internet connectivity effects

This paper explores the impact of communication media and the Internet on connectivity between people. Results from a series of social network studies of media use are used as background for exploration of these impacts. These studies explored the use of all available media among members of an academic research group and among distance learners. Asking about media use as well as about the strength of the tie between communicating pairs revealed that those more strongly tied used more media to communicate than weak ties, and that media use within groups conformed to a unidimensional scale, showing a configuration of different tiers of media use supporting social networks of different ties strengths. These results lead to a number of implications regarding media and Internet connectivity, including: how media use can be added to characteristics of social network ties; how introducing a medium can create latent tie connectivity among group members that provides the technical means for activating weak ties, and also how a change in a medium can disrupt existing weak tie networks; how the tiers of media use also suggest that certain media support different kinds of information flow; and the importance of organization-level decisions about what media to provide and promote. The paper concludes with a discussion of implications for Internet effects.     

Longitudinal analysis of personal networks. The case of Argentinean migrants in Spain

This paper discusses and illustrates various approaches for the longitudinal analysis of personal networks (multilevel analysis, regression analysis, and SIENA). We combined the different types of analyses in a study of the changing personal networks of immigrants. Data were obtained from 25 Argentineans in Spain, who were interviewed twice in a 2-year interval. Qualitative interviews were used to estimate the amount of measurement error and to isolate important predictors. Quantitative analyses showed that the persistence of ties was explained by tie strength, network density, and alters’ country of origin and residence. Furthermore, transitivity appeared to be an important tendency, both for acquiring new contacts and for the relationships among alters. At the network level, immigrants’ networks were remarkably stable in composition and structure despite the high turnover. Clustered graphs have been used to illustrate the results. The results are discussed in light of adaptation to the host society.     

Network recall among older adults with cognitive impairments

Although it is widely accepted that personal networks influence health and illness, network recall remains a major concern. This concern is heightened when studying a population that is vulnerable to cognitive decline. Given these issues, we use data from the Social Network in Alzheimer Disease project to explore similarities and discrepancies between the network perceptions of focal participants and study partners. By leveraging data on a sample of older adults with normal cognition, mild cognitive impairment, and early stage dementia, we explore how cognitive impairment influences older adults’ perceptions of their personal networks. We find that the average individual is more likely to omit weaker, peripheral ties from their self-reported networks than stronger, central ties. Despite observing only moderate levels of focal-partner corroboration across our sample, we find minimal evidence of perceptual differences across diagnostic groups. We offer two broad conclusions. First, self-reported network data, though imperfect, offer a reasonable account of the core people in one’s life. Second, our findings assuage concerns that cognitively impaired older adults have skewed perceptions of their personal networks.     

Network cohesion and social support

This article analyses the effects of personal network cohesion on different types of social support using two dimensions of cohesion: network closure (defined as a tightly knit set of actors around the ego) and cliquishness (defined as the extent to which an actor is connected with a number of cohesive sub-sets of alters). Data were obtained from a personal networks’ survey conducted in Catalonia (Spain), which was completed by 441 adults and gathered information about exchange of social support in networks made of 30 alters. A multilevel analysis disentangles the effects on support of these two structural dimensions at the network-level from compositional effects at the network and tie-level. The results show that network closure does not play a relevant role in support once confounders at the network and tie levels are controlled for. However, cliquishness has a significant association with labor-related support and housing support, net of statistical controls. Implications of these results in network research are discussed.     

Gamers’ confidants: Massively Multiplayer Online Game participation and core networks in China

Through a survey of more than 18,000 participants in a Chinese Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMOG), this study examines how the size and diversity of Chinese gamers’ core networks vary by individuals’ sociodemographic, socioeconomic and game-related characteristics. It represents the first study focusing exclusively on the gamer population and one of the most recent examining personal networks in contemporary China, home to over 560 million Internet users. We found that Chinese gamers have notably larger and more diverse core networks than those of major studies. Coplaying patterns and attachment to the game community contributed significantly to network size and diversity.     

A network centrality bias: Central individuals in workplace networks have more supportive coworkers

Combining the results of two empirical studies, we investigate the role of alters’ motivation in explaining change in ego’s network position over time. People high in communal motives, who are prone to supportive and altruistic behavior in their interactions with others as a way to gain social acceptance, prefer to establish ties with co-workers occupying central positions in organizational social networks. This effect results in a systematic network centrality bias: The personal network of central individuals (individuals with many incoming ties from colleagues) is more likely to contain more supportive and altruistic people than the personal network of individuals who are less central (individuals with fewer incoming ties). This result opens the door to the possibility that the effects of centrality so frequently documented in empirical studies may be due, at least in part, to characteristics of the alters in an ego’s personal community, rather than to egos themselves. Our findings invite further empirical research on how alters’ motives affect the returns that people can reap from their personal networks in organizations.     

Network Instability in Times of Stability

Personal networks undergo change in response to major life course events. Individual, relational, and network characteristics that influence network instability in the absence of a significant life transition/crisis are less understood. We focus on those ties that transition from active to dormant. Because the shift to dormancy is often interpreted as a reduction in support or social capital, it is considered problematic. This study is based on longitudinal survey data of middle‐class adults who did not undergo life changes. Even in this context of relative stability, support networks experience rates of dormancy similar to those observed during periods of major upheaval. Tie dormancy is unrelated to individual characteristics, network size and density, or homophily along dimensions other than sex. Frequency and medium of communication are particularly notable as factors that were not related to tie dormancy. Ties were less likely to become dormant if they were geographically or emotionally close, immediate kin or neighbors, highly supportive, the same sex, or more embedded in the network. These findings provide context for how support networks operate when not buffeted by exogenous forces. They provide a baseline for understanding the impact on networks of transitions, trauma, new media, and difficult life circumstances.     

“Defriending” in a polarized age: Political and racial homophily and tie dissolution

Given increased political polarization and racial tension in the wake of the 2016 presidential election in the United States, this study examines dropped ties in personal networks at that time based on political and racial identities. We employed data from the 2015–2018 UCNets study (n = 1159), a longitudinal, representative data set of the San Francisco Bay Area. In late 2015 and early 2016 it generated personal network data via multiple name generators, eliciting alters whom respondents socialized with, confided in, received advice from, exchanged social support with, and found difficult. Using multilevel multinomial logit models, we then examined various reasons for tie dissolution immediately following the inauguration of Trump in early 2017. The results show that among young adults, politically dissimilar alters were more likely to be dropped due to disagreements. With respect to racial homophily, we found that interracial dyads were more likely to be dropped because of drifting apart or some other reason for both younger and older cohorts. Overall, there is some support for the notion that dropped ties due to political disagreements did occur immediately following the 2016 election, but the results highlight the continuing significance of race in personal networks.     

An agent-based model of network effects on tax compliance and evasion

Agent-based models are flexible analytical tools suitable for exploring and understanding complex systems such as tax compliance and evasion. The agent-based model created in this research builds upon two other agent-based models of tax evasion, the Korobow et al., 2007, Hokamp and Pickhardt, 2010 models. The model utilizes their rules for taxpayer behavior and apprehension of tax evaders in order to test the effects of network topologies in the propagation of evasive behavior. Findings include that network structures have a significant impact on the dynamics of tax compliance, demonstrating that taxpayers are more likely to declare all their income in networks with higher levels of centrality across the agents, especially when faced with large penalties proportional to their incomes. These results suggest that network structures should be chosen selectively when modeling tax compliance, as different topologies yield different results. Additionally, this research analyzed the special case of a power law distribution and found that targeting highly interconnected individuals resulted in a lower mean gross tax rate than targeting disconnected individuals, due to the penalties inflating the mean gross tax rate in the latter case.     

Approaches to blockmodeling dynamic networks: A Monte Carlo simulation study

Blockmodeling refers to a variety of statistical methods for reducing and simplifying large and complex networks. While methods for blockmodeling networks observed at one time point are well established, it is only recently that researchers have proposed several methods for analysing dynamic networks (i.e., networks observed at multiple time points). The considered approaches are based on k-means or stochastic blockmodeling, with different ways being used to model time dependency among time points. Their novelty means they have yet to be extensively compared and evaluated and the paper therefore aims to compare and evaluate them using Monte Carlo simulations. Different network characteristics are considered, including whether tie formation is random or governed by local network mechanisms. The results show the Dynamic Stochastic Blockmodel (Matias and Miele 2017) performs best if the blockmodel does not change; otherwise, the Stochastic Blockmodel for Multipartite Networks (Bar-Hen et al. 2020) does.     

The Networked Household

The authors argue that individuals, rather than family solidarities, have become the primary unit of household connectivity. Many households do not operate as traditional densely knit groups but as more sparsely knit social networks where individuals juggle their somewhat separate agendas and schedules. At a time when many people enact multiple, individual roles at home, in the community and at work, the authors ask: how do adult household members communicate with each other? How do adult household members use information and communication technologies (ICTs) to organize, communicate and coordinate their leisure and social behavior both inside and outside the home? Interviews and surveys conducted in 2004-2005 in the Toronto, Canada area of East York show that households remain connected - but as networks rather than solidary groups. The authors describe how networked individuals bridge their relationships and connect with each other inside and outside the home. ICTs have afforded household members the ability to go about on their separate ways while staying more connected - by mobile phone, email and IM - as well as by traditional landlines. In such ways, rather than pulling families apart, ICTs often facilitate communication, kinship and functional integration.     

Do transnational brokers always win? A multilevel analysis of social support

Migrants often maintain relationships with significant others located in their countries of origin, which results in having transnational interpersonal ties in addition to local ones. The majority of previous studies indicate that financial and social remittances flow from countries of immigration to the countries of emigration through migrants and their networks. However, less is known about who is involved in those exchanges, what kind of supportive resources flow within and across nation-state borders, and what level of individual cross-border engagement of migrants is related to those flows. We ask whether and how transnationality as an individual attribute, together with other personal, dyadic, and supradyadic characteristics, explain received social support. Drawing on data from 100 ego-centric networks collected from Turkish migrants in Germany, the results indicate that not only the dyadic level but also network structure, the position occupied by individuals in the network and their level of transnationality explain supportive resource flows within and across borders.     

Neighborhoods in the Network Society the e-Neighbors study

This study examines whether the Internet is increasingly a part of everyday neighborhood interactions, and in what specific contexts Internet use affords the formation of local social ties. Studies of Internet and community have found that information and communication technologies provide new opportunities for social interaction, but that they may also increase privatism by isolating people in their homes. This paper argues that while the Internet may encourage communication across great distances, it may also facilitate interactions near the home. Unlike traditional community networking studies, which focus on bridging the digital divide, this study focuses on bridging the divide between the electronic and parochial realms. Detailed, longitudinal social network surveys were completed with the residents of four contrasting neighborhoods over a period of three years. Three of the four neighborhoods were provided with a neighborhood email discussion list and a neighborhood website. Hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) was used to model over time the number of strong and weak ties, emailed, met in-person, and talked to on the telephone. The neighborhood email lists were also analyzed for content. The results suggest that with experience using the Internet, the size of local social networks and email communication with local networks increases. The addition of a neighborhood email list further increases the number of weak neighborhood ties, but does not increase communication multiplexity. However, neighborhood effects reduce the influence of everyday Internet use, as well as the experimental intervention, in communities that lack the context to support local tie formation.