Social network analysis software (SNA software) is

software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...

which facilitates

quantitative Quantitative may refer to: * Quantitative research, scientific investigation of quantitative properties * Quantitative analysis (disambiguation) * Quantitative verse, a metrical system in poetry * Statistics, also known as quantitative analysis ...

or qualitative analysis of social networks, by describing features of a network either through numerical or visual representation.

Overview

Networks can consist of anything from families,

project team In a project, a project team or team is defined as "an interdependent collection of individuals who work together towards a common goal and who share responsibility for specific outcomes of their organizations". An additional requirement to the or ...

classroom A classroom or schoolroom is a learning space in which both children and adults learn. Classrooms are found in educational institutions of all kinds, ranging from preschools to universities, and may also be found in other places where education ...

sports team A sports team is a group of individuals who play sports (sports player), usually team sports, on the same team. The number of players in the group depends on type of the sports requirements. Historically, sports teams and the people who play ...

legislature A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its p ...

nation-states A nation state is a political unit where the state and nation are congruent. It is a more precise concept than "country", since a country does not need to have a predominant ethnic group. A nation, in the sense of a common ethnicity, may i ...

disease vector In epidemiology, a disease vector is any living agent that carries and transmits an infectious pathogen to another living organism; agents regarded as vectors are organisms, such as parasites or microbes. The first major discovery of a disease vec ...

s, membership on networking websites like Twitter or Facebook, or even the Internet. Networks can consist of direct linkages between nodes or indirect linkages based upon shared attributes, shared attendance at events, or common affiliations. Network features can be at the level of individual

node In general, a node is a localized swelling (a "knot") or a point of intersection (a vertex). Node may refer to: In mathematics *Vertex (graph theory), a vertex in a mathematical graph *Vertex (geometry), a point where two or more curves, lines, ...

dyad Dyad or dyade may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Dyad (music), a set of two notes or pitches * ''Dyad'' (novel), by Michael Brodsky, 1989 * ''Dyad'' (video game), 2012 * ''Dyad 1909'' and ''Dyad 1929'', ballets by Wayne McGregor Other uses ...

s, triads, ties and/or edges, or the entire network. For example, node-level features can include network phenomena such as

betweenness Betweenness is an algorithmic problem in order theory about ordering a collection of items subject to constraints that some items must be placed between others.. It has applications in bioinformatics. and was shown to be NP-complete by . Problem ...

and

centrality In graph theory and network analysis, indicators of centrality assign numbers or rankings to nodes within a graph corresponding to their network position. Applications include identifying the most influential person(s) in a social network, key ...

, or individual attributes such as age, sex, or income. SNA software generates these features from raw network data formatted in an edgelist, adjacency list, or

adjacency matrix In graph theory and computer science, an adjacency matrix is a square matrix used to represent a finite graph. The elements of the matrix indicate whether pairs of vertices are adjacent or not in the graph. In the special case of a finite simp ...

(also called sociomatrix), often combined with (individual/node-level) attribute data. Though the majority of network analysis software uses a plain text ASCII data format, some software packages contain the capability to utilize relational databases to import and/or store network features.

Features

Visual representations of

social network A social network is a social structure made up of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), sets of dyadic ties, and other social interactions between actors. The social network perspective provides a set of methods for an ...

s are important to understand network data and convey the result of the analysis. Visualization often also facilitates qualitative interpretation of network data. With respect to visualization, network analysis tools are used to change the layout, colors, size and other properties of the network representation. Some SNA software can perform

predictive analysis Predictive analytics encompasses a variety of statistical techniques from data mining, predictive modeling, and machine learning that analyze current and historical facts to make predictions about future or otherwise unknown events. In busines ...

. This includes using network phenomena such as a tie to predict individual level outcomes (often called peer influence or contagion modeling), using individual-level phenomena to predict network outcomes such as the formation of a tie/edge (often called homophily models) or particular type of triad, or using network phenomena to predict other network phenomena, such as using a triad formation at time 0 to predict tie formation at time 1.

Collection of social network analysis tools and libraries

References

Notes

*Barnes, J. A. "Class and Committees in a Norwegian Island Parish", ''Human Relations'' 7:39-58 *Borgatti, S. (2002). NetDraw Software for Network Visualization. Lexington, KY: Analytic Technologies. *Borgatti, S. E. (2002). Ucinet for Windows: Software for Social Network Analysis. Harvard, MA: Analytic Technologies. *Berkowitz, S. D. 1982. ''An Introduction to Structural Analysis: The Network Approach to Social Research.'' Toronto: Butterworth. * Brandes, Ulrik, and Thomas Erlebach (Eds.). 2005.
Network Analysis: Methodological Foundations
' Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer-Verlag. *Breiger, Ronald L. 2004. "The Analysis of Social Networks." Pp. 505–526 in ''Handbook of Data Analysis,'' edited by Melissa Hardy and Alan Bryman. London: Sage Publications.
Excerpts in pdf format
' *Burt, Ronald S. (1992). ''Structural Holes: The Structure of Competition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. *Carrington, Peter J., John Scott and

Stanley Wasserman Stanley Wasserman (born August 29, 1951) is an American statistician and prior to retirement was the Rudy Professor of Statistics, Psychology, and Sociology at Indiana University Bloomington and the Academic Supervisor of the International laborat ...

(Eds.). 2005. ''Models and Methods in Social Network Analysis.'' New York: Cambridge University Press. *Christakis, Nicholas and

James H. Fowler James H. Fowler (born February 18, 1970) is an American social sciences, social scientist specializing in social networks, cooperation, political participation, and genopolitics (the study of the genetic basis of political behavior). He is currentl ...

"The Spread of Obesity in a Large Social Network Over 32 Years," ''New England Journal of Medicine'' 357 (4): 370-379 (26 July 2007) *Doreian, Patrick, Vladimir Batagelj, and Anuska Ferligoj. (2005). ''Generalized Blockmodeling.'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. *Freeman, Linton C. (2004) ''The Development of Social Network Analysis: A Study in the Sociology of Science.'' Vancouver: Empirical Press. *Hansen, William B. and Reese, Eric L. 2009
Network Genie Users Manual
Greensboro, NC: Tanglewood Research. *Hill, R. and Dunbar, R. 2002. "Social Network Size in Humans." Human Nature, Vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 53–7
Google

pdf
*Huisman, M. and Van Duijn, M. A. J. (2005)
Software for Social Network Analysis
In P J. Carrington, J. Scott, & S. Wasserman (Editors), ''Models and Methods in Social Network Analysis'' (pp. 270–316). New York: Cambridge University Press. *Krebs, Valdis (2002) Uncloaking Terrorist Networks, ''First Monday'', volume 7, number 4 (Application of SNA software to terror net
Web Reference
) *Krebs, Valdis (2008) A Brief Introduction to Social Network Analysis (Common metrics in most SNA softwar

) *Krebs, Valdis (2008) Various Case Studies & Projects using Social Network Analysis softwar

*Lin, Nan, Ronald S. Burt and Karen Cook, eds. (2001). ''Social Capital: Theory and Research.'' New York: Aldine de Gruyter. *Mullins, Nicholas. 1973. ''Theories and Theory Groups in Contemporary American Sociology.'' New York: Harper and Row. *Müller-Prothmann, Tobias (2006): Leveraging Knowledge Communication for Innovation. Framework, Methods and Applications of Social Network Analysis in Research and Development, Frankfurt a. M. et al.: Peter Lang, . *

via

JSTOR JSTOR (; short for ''Journal Storage'') is a digital library founded in 1995 in New York City. Originally containing digitized back issues of academic journals, it now encompasses books and other primary sources as well as current issues of j ...

*Moody, James, and Douglas R. White (2003). "Structural Cohesion and Embeddedness: A Hierarchical Concept of Social Groups." ''American Sociological Review'' 68(1):103-127

* *Nohria, Nitin and Robert Eccles (1992). ''Networks in Organizations.'' second ed. Boston: Harvard Business Press. *Nooy, Wouter d., A. Mrvar and Vladimir Batagelj. (2005). ''Exploratory Social Network Analysis with Pajek.'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. *Scott, John. (2000). ''Social Network Analysis: A Handbook.'' 2nd Ed. Newberry Park, CA: Sage. *Tilly, Charles. (2005). ''Identities, Boundaries, and Social Ties.'' Boulder, CO: Paradigm press. *Valente, Thomas. (1995). ''Network Models of the Diffusion of Innovation.'' Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press. *

Wasserman, Stanley Stanley Wasserman (born August 29, 1951) is an American statistician and prior to retirement was the Rudy Professor of Statistics, Psychology, and Sociology at Indiana University Bloomington and the Academic Supervisor of the International laborat ...

, & Faust, Katherine. (1994). ''Social Networks Analysis: Methods and Applications.'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. *Watkins, Susan Cott. (2003). "Social Networks." Pp. 909–910 in ''Encyclopedia of Population.'' rev. ed. Edited by Paul Demeny and Geoffrey McNicoll. New York: Macmillan Reference. * *Watts, Duncan. (2004). ''Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age.'' W. W. Norton & Company. *Wellman, Barry (1999). ''Networks in the Global Village.'' Boulder, CO: Westview Press. * *Wellman, Barry and Berkowitz, S.D. (1988). ''Social Structures: A Network Approach.'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. * *White, Harrison, Scott Boorman and Ronald Breiger. 1976. "Social Structure from Multiple Networks: I Blockmodels of Roles and Positions." ''

American Journal of Sociology The ''American Journal of Sociology'' is a peer-reviewed bi-monthly academic journal that publishes original research and book reviews in the field of sociology and related social sciences. It was founded in 1895 as the first journal in its disci ...

'' 81: 730–80.

External links

International Network for Social Network Analysis The International Network for Social Network Analysis (INSNA) is a professional academic association of researchers and practitioners of social network analysis. Members have interests in social networks as a new theoretical paradigm, in methodologi ...

(INSNA) list of software packages and libraries
Computer Programs for Social Network Analysis
page. * 2010 : A comparative study of social network analysis tools by Combe, Largeron, Egyed-Zsigmond and Géry

{{DEFAULTSORT:Social Network Analysis Software Social network analysis software, Social networks Comparisons of mathematical software Data analysis software Social network analysis