The lecture by Christoph Stadtfeld from ETH Zurich will take place at the Complexity Science Hub Vienna.
Location: Room 201
If you are interested in participating, please email to office@csh.ac.at
Abstract
Social networks are complex, dynamic systems. However, they emerge on a small scale from the actions of individuals that do not necessarily overlook its full complexity. Yet, emerging network outcomes such as segregation, cluster formation, or the distribution of knowledge can have a direct impact on them and can restrict their choices and opportunities to act. In the study of social network dynamics it is thus important to simultaneously consider the link between the two levels levels: the macro-level of large-scale network structures and the micro-level of individuals’ opportunities, preferences, and actions. This talk illustrates how state-of-the-art statistical network methods and computational simulation techniques can be combined to investigate the micro-macro link in social networks. Recent empirical work in the context of the Swiss StudentLife study will illustrate the value of this approach.
Bio
Christoph Stadtfeld is an assistant professor of Social Networks at ETH Zürich, Switzerland. He develops methods for the statistical analysis of dynamic social network data, and publishes theoretical-empirical work on network dynamics in different sub fields of sociology. Both research lines have been featured in leading sociological, methodological and interdisciplinary journals (e.g. Sociological Methodology, Sociological Methods & Research, Social Networks, Social Forces, PNAS). To make the methodological work accessible to the applied social networks community, Christoph Stadtfeld develops and contributes to scientific software packages, like the Goldfish package in R.