CMN 10V Week 7 Networks and News
questions n answers 2025/2026
Social Networks: Introduction - CORRECT ANSWER ✔✔Research Areas:
- Health Communication
- Social Influence
- Social Network Interventions Utilizing Online Platforms
Motivating Questions:
What is social network or social network analysis useful for?
- How would you identify the most influential individual among your Facebook friends?
- Have you wondered how Google finds the best page for your question?
- In a local community, who is the best individual to immunize to stop a flu epidemic?
A shift from understanding individuals to understanding collectives
Objective: to gain an understanding of social networks and their implications
Network Science - CORRECT ANSWER ✔✔The scientific interdisciplinary study of how complex
networks operate
A structural way of thinking
1. Connections or relations matter
2. Networks create asymmetries
,3. Networks have no agency but they activate mechanisms and generate emerging
phenomenon
- ex. organizational charts of major technology companies showcase structures of connection,
asymmetries, emerging phenomena
Three Main Traditions that lead to Social Network Analysis
Social Psychology <-> Group Dynamics
Anthropology <-> Structures of Communities
Mathematical Sociology <-> Social Movements
Networks as Objects - CORRECT ANSWER ✔✔Social network analysis (SNA): the process of
investigating social structures through the use of network and graph theories
Network methods can focus on:
dyads - two actors and their ties
triads - three actors and their ties
larger systems - subgroups of individuals or entire networks
Node: a unit of analysis
- can be people, countries, or organizations
- have both exogenous and endogenous attributes
- also called vertices or points
Tie: a relation connecting two nodes
- can have attributes (positive, negative, weighted, unweighted)
- also called edges when undirected or arcs when directed
, Degree: the number of ties each node has to other nodes
Ego network: the web and characteristics of social relationships that surround an individual,
from the focal individual's perspective
Global network: the web and characteristics of social relationships that connect everyone
Network Topologies: the topological structure of a network and may be depicted physically or
logically
Network data and measurement - CORRECT ANSWER ✔✔Network dataset: a matrix of numbers
of 0 and 1
- Rows and Columns list the nodes
- 1 indicates a tie between 2 nodes
- 0 indicates no ties between 2 nodes
Arcs List 6 | 1 3 5 7 9
indicates node 6 has ties with 1,3,5,7 and 9
Data Collection - Survey
- name generator method introduced by Laumann 1966
- Names-generator: a question that asks respondents to enumerate individuals with whom they
share a particular type of relationship
- Name interpreters - questions that ask respondents about the attributes (e.g. gender, age,
years known of individuals they named in response to the name generator)
Example questions:
- Who are the people with whom you discuss matters important to you?
questions n answers 2025/2026
Social Networks: Introduction - CORRECT ANSWER ✔✔Research Areas:
- Health Communication
- Social Influence
- Social Network Interventions Utilizing Online Platforms
Motivating Questions:
What is social network or social network analysis useful for?
- How would you identify the most influential individual among your Facebook friends?
- Have you wondered how Google finds the best page for your question?
- In a local community, who is the best individual to immunize to stop a flu epidemic?
A shift from understanding individuals to understanding collectives
Objective: to gain an understanding of social networks and their implications
Network Science - CORRECT ANSWER ✔✔The scientific interdisciplinary study of how complex
networks operate
A structural way of thinking
1. Connections or relations matter
2. Networks create asymmetries
,3. Networks have no agency but they activate mechanisms and generate emerging
phenomenon
- ex. organizational charts of major technology companies showcase structures of connection,
asymmetries, emerging phenomena
Three Main Traditions that lead to Social Network Analysis
Social Psychology <-> Group Dynamics
Anthropology <-> Structures of Communities
Mathematical Sociology <-> Social Movements
Networks as Objects - CORRECT ANSWER ✔✔Social network analysis (SNA): the process of
investigating social structures through the use of network and graph theories
Network methods can focus on:
dyads - two actors and their ties
triads - three actors and their ties
larger systems - subgroups of individuals or entire networks
Node: a unit of analysis
- can be people, countries, or organizations
- have both exogenous and endogenous attributes
- also called vertices or points
Tie: a relation connecting two nodes
- can have attributes (positive, negative, weighted, unweighted)
- also called edges when undirected or arcs when directed
, Degree: the number of ties each node has to other nodes
Ego network: the web and characteristics of social relationships that surround an individual,
from the focal individual's perspective
Global network: the web and characteristics of social relationships that connect everyone
Network Topologies: the topological structure of a network and may be depicted physically or
logically
Network data and measurement - CORRECT ANSWER ✔✔Network dataset: a matrix of numbers
of 0 and 1
- Rows and Columns list the nodes
- 1 indicates a tie between 2 nodes
- 0 indicates no ties between 2 nodes
Arcs List 6 | 1 3 5 7 9
indicates node 6 has ties with 1,3,5,7 and 9
Data Collection - Survey
- name generator method introduced by Laumann 1966
- Names-generator: a question that asks respondents to enumerate individuals with whom they
share a particular type of relationship
- Name interpreters - questions that ask respondents about the attributes (e.g. gender, age,
years known of individuals they named in response to the name generator)
Example questions:
- Who are the people with whom you discuss matters important to you?
