RECIPROCITY AND THE EMERGENCE OF POWER LAWS IN SOCIAL NETWORKS

DOI10.1142/S0129183106009473MaRDI QIDQ5481856zbMATH OpenFDO

Authors Michael Schnegg

Publication date 24 August 2006

Published in International Journal of Modern Physics C (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0603005

zbMATH Keywords

reciprocityscale free networksanthropologycross cultural comparison

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Social networks; opinion dynamics (91D30) Time-dependent statistical mechanics (dynamic and nonequilibrium) (82C99)

Abstract: Research in network science has shown that many naturally occurring and technologically constructed networks are scale free, that means a power law degree distribution emerges from a growth model in which each new node attaches to the existing network with a probability proportional to its number of links (=degree). Little is known about whether the same principles of local attachment and global properties apply to societies as well. Empirical evidence from six ethnographic case studies shows that complex social networks have significantly lower scaling exponents gamma ~ 1 than have been assumed in the past. Apparently humans do not only look for the most prominent players to play with. Moreover cooperation in humans is characterized through reciprocity, the tendency to give to those from whom one has received in the past. Both variables -- reciprocity and the scaling exponent -- are negatively correlated ($r=-0.767,sig=0.075$). If we include this effect in simulations of growing networks, degree distributions emerge that are much closer to those empirically observed. While the proportion of nodes with small degrees decreases drastically as we introduce reciprocity, the scaling exponent is more robust and changes only when a relatively large proportion of attachment decisions follow this rule. If social networks are less scale free than previously assumed this has far reaching implications for policy makers, public health programs and marketing alike.

Recommendations

• Measuring reciprocity in a directed preferential attachment network
• Emergence of Scaling in Random Networks
• Reciprocity in directed networks
• The ``cameo principle and the origin of scale-free graphs in social networks
• Asymptotic dependence of in- and out-degrees in a preferential attachment model with reciprocity

Cites work

• Collective dynamics of `small-world' networks
• Concurrency and Commitment: Network Scheduling and Its Consequences for Diffusion¹
• Network science. With Márton Pósfai
• The Structure and Function of Complex Networks
• The evolution of cooperation
• Winners don't take all: Characterizing the competition for links on the web

Cited in

(13)

• Cognitive resource allocation determines the organization of personal networks
• Editorial: Tails and ties
• CLUSTERIZATION, FRUSTRATION AND COLLECTIVITY IN RANDOM NETWORKS
• Random networks with heterogeneous reciprocity
• Reciprocity in directed networks
• EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF THE STRUCTURE OF A SOCIAL NETWORK AND HUMAN DYNAMICS IN A VIRTUAL SOCIETY
• The strength of long-range ties in population-scale social networks
• AGGREGATE DYNAMICS IN AN EVOLUTIONARY NETWORK MODEL
• The gravitational law of social interaction
• OPTIMIZATION OF HIERARCHICAL STRUCTURES OF INFORMATION FLOW
• DYNAMICS OF NETWORKS AND OPINIONS
• Triadic closure dynamics drives scaling laws in social multiplex networks
• Reciprocity networks and the participation problem

This page was built for publication: RECIPROCITY AND THE EMERGENCE OF POWER LAWS IN SOCIAL NETWORKS

Report a bug (only for logged in users!)Click here to report a bug for this page (MaRDI item Q5481856)