Week 3: How are communication networks formed?

Content for the week of Monday, January 26, 2026

Tuesday

Assignment Due (on Monday):

• Reading Review

Readings:

• Feld, S. L. (1981). The focused organization of social ties. American Journal of Sociology, 86(5), 1015–1035.
• McPherson, M., Smith-Lovin, L., & Cook, J. M. (2001). Birds of a Feather: Homophily in Social Networks. Annual Review of Sociology, 27, 415–444.
• Monge, P. R., & Contractor, N. S. (2003). Theories of communication networks. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. (pp. 298–314) - On Brightspace under Content > Readings

Note: This week involves reading two academic articles. Read this to understand my expectations and some tips for reading and understanding these articles. This video goes over how you can use Claude.ai to understand papers better.

Lecture Video:

• Tie Formation [14:55]

• Slides

Concepts:

• Exposure, formation, maintenance, decay
• Homophily
• Reciprocity
• Triadic closure

Thursday

Supplementary R lectures (watch before class):

• Why R + Programming principles lecture [12:53]

Class Schedule:

• R Lab 2 - Creating Networks