Structural analysis of social networks with respect to different levels of aggregation

Hummell, Hans J.; Sodeur, Wolfgang

Mathématiques informatique et sciences humaines, Tome 137 (1997), pp. 37-60.

Cet article vise à rapprocher deux traditions de recherche, l'analyse multi-niveaux et les réseaux sociaux. On présente dans ce but une stratégie qui trouve son origine dans la typologie des unités d'analyse et de leurs propriétés proposée par Paul F. Lazarsfeld et Herbert Menzel. Leur classification est tout d'abord élargie de manière à prendre en considération un plus grand nombre de concepts relationnels qu'ils n'en avaient retenus à l'époque ; elle est ensuite utilisée pour traduire une question de recherche qui se présente au premier abord comme relevant purement de l'analyse de réseaux en un problème classique d'analyse des relations entre variables concernant différentes unités à différents niveaux d'agrégation. Bien que les données analysées soient choisies dans le domaine de la sociométrie et que les concepts d'équilibre et de transitivité viennent de la psychologie sociale, il devrait apparaître clair que la stratégie de recherche proposée ne voit pas sa pertinence limitée aux conditions théoriques et empiriques propres à l'exemple choisi comme illustration.

The article aims at the integration of the two research traditions of multi-level and of network analysis. To this effect, a strategy is presented which can be traced back to P.F. Lazarsfeld and H. Menzel's typology of units and of their properties. After having extended their classification to take account of more network concepts than was needed at their time, the Lazarsfeld-Menzel-Classification is used as a conceptual instrument to translate a research question, which first looks like a specialty of network analysis, into a standard problem of treating relationships between variables of different units at different levels of aggregation. Though the data set to be analyzed is taken from sociometric research and the selected theoretical framework from “balance” and “transitivity” theory of social psychology, it should be clear that the proposed research strategy is not restricted to the empirical or theoretical specificities of the example chosen for its illustration.

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