Social Network Ties Research Articles

Facilitating Individual Innovation from the Perspective of Social Network Ties: A Fuzzy‐Set QCA Approach

ABSTRACTPursuing successful innovation poses a significant challenge for employees, as generating creative ideas does not guarantee final innovation outcomes (i.e., products). To enrich our understanding of the critical factors that contribute to the success of transforming creative ideas into innovation outcomes, drawing on the social network perspective and configuration theory, we utilize the fuzzy‐set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) approach to identify how different social network tie configurations facilitate various stages of individual innovation, including idea generation and idea implementation. Through a survey of 216 R&D employees in China, we have identified four pathways with distinct configurations that promote high levels of idea generation and three pathways that facilitate high levels of idea implementation. This work contributes to developing a configurational strategy for facilitating individual innovation from the perspective of social network ties, thus shedding light on how employees might successfully traverse different stages of the innovation journey.

Buyer-initiated knowledge payment facilitates free knowledge contribution in knowledge-sharing platforms: an integration of relational signaling theory and attribution theory

PurposeThe model of pay-for-knowledge incentivizes individuals with financial rewards for sharing their expertise, facilitating a transactional exchange between knowledge providers (sellers) and seekers (buyers). While this model is effective in promoting paid contributions, its influence on free knowledge exchanges remains ambiguous, creating uncertainty about its overall impact on platform knowledge ecosystems. This study aims to explore the mechanim of how knowledge payment influences free knowledge contribution. Based on relational signaling theory, this study posits that a buyer’s payment for knowledge acts as a positive relational signal in the buyer–seller relationship and examines how the signaling effect varies across different social contexts through attribution theory.Design/methodology/approachThis paper empirically tests the hypotheses by analyzing a data set comprising 630 instances from 359 unique knowledge sellers on Zhihu, a prominent knowledge-sharing platform in China. This paper use zero-inflated negative binomial models to conduct this analysis.FindingsThe findings reveal that when buyers pay for knowledge, this action positively influences sellers to contribute knowledge for free. However, the strength of this influence is moderated by the platform’s social functions: appreciation feedback tends to weaken this effect, while social network ties enhance it.Originality/valuePrior research has predominantly focused on the financial incentives of pay-for-knowledge and its spillover effects on unpaid users’ activities. This study shifts the focus to the social dimensions of pay-for-knowledge, arguing that buyer-initiated knowledge payments signal buyers’ commitment to foster reciprocal relationships with sellers. It expands the literature on the relationship between knowledge payment and contribution, moving beyond financial incentives to include social factors, thus enriching our understanding of the interplay between paid and free knowledge activities. Additionally, the empirical evidence supports the efficacy of pay-for-knowledge in promoting both free and paid contributions within knowledge-sharing platforms.

The Ties That Bind: The Association Between Social Network Ties, Integration, and Stress Among Incarcerated Women

Social integration is theorized to enhance psychological well-being and reduce stress among incarcerated women. However, little empirical research has examined the association between prison social integration and women’s stress during incarceration. This study expands on previous research by (a) examining the relationship between different types of prison network ties among incarcerated women and self-reported stress and (b) exploring whether women’s perceptions of social integration mediate the association between prison network ties and stress. Using ordinal logistic models that incorporate social network and survey data from two women’s prisons in Pennsylvania ( N = 223) (WO-PINS), we find that pseudo-family–based, friendship-based, and trust-based network ties formed during incarceration are associated with reduced stress among incarcerated women. However, we find limited evidence that perceptions of social integration mediate the relationship between prison network ties and stress, suggesting that prison network ties are associated with stress reduction independent of an individual’s perception of integration.

Cookin’ the Books: How Waitlist Management Biases Data Production in Built for Zero Communities

Built for Zero (BFZ) is a new data-driven approach to allocating housing assistance to homeless households. BFZ implementation includes the production/maintenance of a “by-name list” (BNL). The BNL is a regularly updated spreadsheet with personalised data about everyone who enters and exits a local homeless system (i.e., flow). Local administrators use the BNL to produce “by-name data” (BND). BND lets administrators monitor and manipulate system flow in “real time.” Scholars have not analysed how administrators manage their BNL and produce BND. This paper starts that conservation by answering three questions with interview data that was collected from administrators at 28 “BFZ communities” (i.e., homeless systems implementing BFZ): How do administrators manage their BNL? What factors influence BNL management? How does BNL management affect BND accuracy? Using thematic analysis, the author provides evidence that administrators manage the length of their BNL by removing “inactive” clients who have disengaged from service providers. Administrators try to verify housing status before deeming someone inactive. The verification process is shaped by social policies, network ties, virtual interactions, and administrative discretion. Because those things vary across homeless systems, administrators face different constraints and enablers whilst verifying someone’s housing status. The intersection of contextual factors and subjective processes biases the BND administrators produce from their BNL.

How the Human-Like Characteristics of AI Assistants Affect Employee Creativity: A Social Network Ties Perspective

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) powered AI assistants provide opportunities to promote employee creativity. However, existing research ignores exploring the impact of AI assistants’ unique human-like characteristics on employee creativity, which means there are insufficient practical guidelines for implementing and designing AI assistants to promote employee creativity. Based on social network theory, this study constructs a theoretical model to investigate the relationship between the human-like characteristics of AI assistants and employee creativity and uses structural equation modeling to analyze questionnaire data from 243 employees. The results show that perceived intelligence and anthropomorphism of AI assistants positively influence employees-AI instrumental and expressive ties, both of which can enhance employee creativity. In particular, perceived intelligence has a stronger effect on the employee-AI instrumental ties, while perceived anthropomorphism has a stronger effect on the employee-AI expressive ties. In addition, the interaction intensity weakens the positive effects of perceived anthropomorphism on employee-AI instrumental and expressive ties. These findings provide practical guidance for implementing and designing AI assistants to promote employee creativity.

The Ties That Bind: A Systematic Review of Behavioral Research on Social Bonds and Social Ties in Accounting

ABSTRACT We provide a comprehensive review and synthesis of behavioral accounting research on social bonds and social ties. Social bonds represent a person’s subjective sense of interpersonal closeness or connectedness with another, whereas social ties are the relationship networks that connect individuals with one another. We identify 75 articles published in leading accounting journals relevant to our review. The primary contexts examined by prior research that give rise to these social connections include auditors’ identification with their clients, team member identification, and social network ties between client executives, board members, and their various external stakeholders. We structure our synthesis around the antecedents, moderators, and outcomes of these social connections. Cumulatively, our synthesis findings reveal a rich, complex setting where social bonds can sometimes benefit financial reporting and audit quality by promoting proactive knowledge sharing and sometimes harm the financial reporting process by prompting undue favoritism and increased acquiescence. Data Availability: All data used in this project are available through the Google Scholar database. JEL Classifications: M40; M41; M42.

The structure and function of antagonistic ties in village social networks

Negative or antagonistic relationships are common in human social networks, but they are less often studied than positive or friendly relationships. The existence of a capacity to have and to track antagonistic ties raises the possibility that they may serve a useful function in human groups. Here, we analyze empirical data gathered from 24,770 and 22,513 individuals in 176 rural villages in Honduras in two survey waves 2.5 y apart in order to evaluate the possible relevance of antagonistic relationships for broader network phenomena. We find that the small-world effect is more significant in a positive world with negative ties compared to an otherwise similar hypothetical positive world without them. Additionally, we observe that nodes with more negative ties tend to be located near network bridges, with lower clustering coefficients, higher betweenness centralities, and shorter average distances to other nodes in the network. Positive connections tend to have a more localized distribution, while negative connections are more globally dispersed within the networks. Analysis of the possible impact of such negative ties on dynamic processes reveals that, remarkably, negative connections can facilitate the dissemination of information (including novel information experimentally introduced into these villages) to the same degree as positive connections, and that they can also play a role in mitigating idea polarization within village networks. Antagonistic ties hold considerable importance in shaping the structure and function of social networks.

Effects of Trust, Public Engagement, Conflict, and Social Networks on Satisfaction with Ecological Restoration

River restoration is one of the most common, expensive, and environmentally influential forms of restoration, but has little post-restoration assessment of social success. In this study, we use social network theory and analysis (SNA), an emerging approach for understanding social dynamics in restoration projects, to examine the social connections, perceptions of project success, and attitudes of stakeholders involved in a river restoration project. We find that positive and negative social network ties have asymmetrical effects on stakeholders’ attitudes and satisfaction with project outcomes. Trust ties positively influence perceptions of public engagement, while avoidance ties negatively influence satisfaction. Trust in leaders positively influences satisfaction and both public engagement and perceived conflict influence the development of that trust. We contribute to the growing body of research using SNA in natural resource contexts through quantitative tests of social networks’ effects on stakeholder satisfaction with project outcomes.

Mapping the literature of social network ties in business and management field: A bibliometric study

In recent years, academics have focused increasingly on social network connections across different organisations. Social networking for businesses is a topic that crosses many disciplines, including social sciences, computer science, engineering, management, education, sociology, and psychology, so it's no surprise that definitions, methods, and approaches to social networks are constantly debated. Based on a data set of 3466 publications from the Scopus database, the goal of this study is to map the previous literature on social network ties of organisations to the business and management area. The data set was taken from the Scopus database to investigate the main authors, the number of publications, the most influential journals, the most used keywords and the top productive institutions and countries. The goal of this study is to map the previous literature on the social network ties of organisations to the business and management area. The most influential publications, authors, journals, and keywords are thus identified using four methods of bibliographic analysis, as follows: bibliographic coupling, analysis of co-occurrence of authors' keywords, and analysis of co-authorship (a) countries and (b) authors. According to the study’s findings, the USA is the most prolific country, having over 900 publications in the past five years, followed by China and the UK. The publication trend has increased over the last 5 years in the business and management field and will keep increasing because of the growing interest of researchers and practitioners in the given field. Knowledge-based systems are found to be the top productive journal and Hong Kong Polytechnic University is the most influential institution with the highest number of publications.

Mixed Methods for Research on Support Networks of People Experiencing Chronic Illness and Social Marginalization.

Substantial research has focused on how social networks help individuals navigate the illness experience. Sociologists have begun to theorize beyond the binary of strong and weak social network ties (e.g., compartmental, elastic, and disposable ties), citing the social, economic, and health conditions that shape their formation. However, limited research has employed mixed social network methods, which we argue is especially critical for examining the "non-traditional" social support networks of marginalized individuals. We employ quantitative social network methods (i.e., the egocentric network approach) in addition to in-depth interviews and observations, with a novel tool for capturing network data about social groups, to surface these kinds of supportive relationships. Using the case of "nameless ties"-non-kin, non-provider ties who were unidentifiable by given name or were grouped by context or activity rather than individually distinguished-we show how mixed social network methods can illuminate supporters who are commonly overlooked when only using traditional social network analysis. We conclude with a proposal for mixed methods and group alter approaches to successfully observe liminal support ties that is ideal for research about individuals experiencing chronic disability, poverty, housing insecurity, and other forms of social marginalization.

Sites and Ways of Belonging to Diaspora Networks: The Case of the Greek Second Generation in Italy

Abstract To survive over time, a diaspora must create sites of belonging and micro places in which to concentrate the main elements of its “iconography” that can consolidate social networks. This article analyzes how second-generation Greeks in Italy fit into diaspora networks by investigating the ways in which they define their sense of Greekness and use their ethnic resources. The findings of field research show a weakness of (formal and informal) social network ties and the pre-eminence of the family’s role in the process of sociocultural identification and ethnic identity construction. In fact, the second generation’s “ways of belonging” and the sense of attachment to Greece have an autonomous significance and are expressed more at a familial level and less collectively. Familial socialization plays a mediating role in the process of identification and transmission of Greekness, as well as in guiding ways of employing ethnic resources, contributing to the maintenance of the diaspora.

Social network tie functions of social support and social influence and adult smoking abstinence.

Adults' social network ties serve multiple functions and play prominently in quitting smoking. We examined three types of adults' egocentric social networks, including family, friends, and friends online to investigate how two network characteristics with major relevance to health behavior, network size and tie closeness, related to the emotional and confidant support and to pro- and anti-smoking social influence these ties may transmit. We also examine whether the social support and social influence constructs related to smoking abstinence. We utilized baseline and 7-day abstinence survey data from 123 adult current smokers attempting to quit prior to the start of a randomized controlled quit-smoking trial of a social support intervention for quitting smoking on Twitter. To examine study relationships, we estimated Negative Binomial Regression models and Logistic Regression models. For all networks, network size and tie closeness related positively to most of the social support and social influence constructs, with tie closeness related most strongly, especially for online friends. Family pro-smoking social influence related negatively to smoking abstinence, and there were marginally negative relationships for family emotional support and family confidant support. Online friend emotional support had a marginally positive relationship with smoking abstinence. Overall, our findings indicated the importance of the social support and social influence functions of each type of network tie, with larger networks and closer ties related to higher levels of social support and social influence. Moreover, family network pro-smoking social influence may compromise abstinence while emotional support from online friend network ties may reinforce it.

Dynamic social network analysis of a brief alcohol intervention trial in heavy-drinking college students shows spillover effects.

Heavy-drinking college students tend to have close social networks, and there is theoretical and empirical support for the idea that behavior change can spread through those networks via close ties. The objective of this research was to determine whether intervention-induced behavior change in a subset of heavy drinkers in a sociometric (whole) college class-year social network is transmitted to other heavy drinkers in the network, resulting in reduced behavioral risk and change in network ties. We conducted a controlled trial in which most of a first-year college class (N = 1236; 56.9% female) was enrolled, with alcohol use and social network ties measured early in each of three semesters. Following a baseline assessment, the network was divided into two groups, brief motivational intervention (BMI) and natural history control (NHC) according to dormitory residence location. A subset of heavy drinkers in each group was selected, and those in the BMI group received an in-person intervention. Using stochastic actor-oriented modeling, we found a significant tendency for participants in the BMI group to shed ties with individuals with similar drinking behaviors between the first and second semesters, relative to the NHC group. Furthermore, heavy drinkers with reciprocal ties to intervention recipients in the BMI group showed a significant reduction in drinks per week. Individual alcohol interventions appear to have effects both on behavior and network connections among individuals who did not receive the intervention. Continued research is needed to identify the optimal conditions for the diffusion of behavior change.

Collateral Health Effects of Loneliness Care in Japan.

Older patients with loneliness are connected to others through their social network ties and are, therefore, more likely to be influenced by their family environment. We define collateral care as involving the family members of patients suffering from loneliness. This research letter determines what physicians and nurses should be aware of in the families of older patients to manage their health care. A cross-sectional study in Japan was conducted on patients aged 65 years or older together with their accompanying family members, aged 18 years or older. Patient loneliness was assessed using the 3-item version of the UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles) Loneliness Scale (Japanese). The sample comprised 50 pairs of patients and their families. Family income inadequacy was significantly associated with patient loneliness (P = .021). Our data reveal the family's financial instability contributes to patients' loneliness. In addition to traditional forms of direct care, physicians and nurses need to be willing to manage the loneliness of older patients by attempting to provide collateral care, considering family circumstances.

Social network size moderates the association between loneliness and cardiovascular reactivity to acute stress

Loneliness and objective measures of social isolation (e.g., social network size) have been associated with increased risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD). However, the evidence is mixed and the precise causal mechanisms remain unclear. Cardiovascular reactivity (CVR) to acute stress has been posited as a proposed mechanism. This study aimed to investigate: (i) effects of loneliness and social isolation on CVR to stress and, (ii) whether the loneliness – CVR relationship was moderated by social network size. Two hundred and six participants from the Pittsburgh Cold Study underwent a modified version of the Trier Social Stress Task. Cardiovascular measures of systolic (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) and heart rate (HR) were taken throughout the laboratory stress trial. Hierarchical regression analyses found that social network size was positively associated with DBP reactivity (β = 0.19 95 % CI [0.05, 0.29] p = 0.005), while loneliness was not. In addition, social network size moderated the loneliness - DBP reactivity relationship such that a higher number of outer social network ties were beneficial at lower levels of loneliness but not higher. The current study contributes new evidence linking loneliness and social network size to cardiovascular psychophysiology but raises questions about the loneliness - CVD relationship. The findings confirm the importance of social network size and highlight that the characteristics of the networks may be more important than the number of networks.

Beyond scale-free networks: integrating multilayer social networks with molecular clusters in the local spread of COVID-19

This study evaluates the scale-free network assumption commonly used in COVID-19 epidemiology, using empirical social network data from SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant molecular local clusters in Houston, Texas. We constructed genome-informed social networks from contact and co-residence data, tested them for scale-free power-law distributions that imply highly connected hubs, and compared them to alternative models (exponential, log-normal, power-law with exponential cutoff, and Weibull) that suggest more evenly distributed network connections. Although the power-law model failed the goodness of fit test, after incorporating social network ties, the power-law model was at least as good as, if not better than, the alternatives, implying the presence of both hub and non-hub mechanisms in local SARS-CoV-2 transmission. These findings enhance our understanding of the complex social interactions that drive SARS-CoV-2 transmission, thereby informing more effective public health interventions.

Return to sender: Unraveling the role of structural and social network ties in patient sharing networks

Healthcare is increasingly delivered through networks of organizations. Well-structured patient sharing networks are known to have positive associations with the quality of delivered services. However, the drivers of patient sharing relations are rarely studied explicitly. In line with recent developments in network and integration theorizing, we hypothesize that structural and social network ties between organizations are uniquely associated with a higher number of shared patients. We test these hypotheses using a Bayesian zero-dispersed Poisson regression model within the Additive and Multiplicative Effects Framework based on administrative claims data from 732,122 dermatological patients from the Netherlands in 2017. Our results indicate that 2.6% of all dermatological patients are shared and that the amount of shared patients is significantly associated with structural (i.e. emergency contracts) and social (i.e. shared physicians) ties between organizations, confirming our hypotheses. We also find some evidence that patients are shared with more capable organizations. Our findings highlight the role of relational ties in the way health services are delivered. At the same time, they also raise some potential anti-trust concerns.

“Japa”: An Exploratory Study of the Roles of Social Media in an Out-Migration Trend in Nigeria

This study seeks to understand the roles of social media in the new “Japa” migration trend in Nigeria. As part of this main objective, the study investigates the demographic characteristics of these new migrants—their age, gender, and socioeconomic status classifications. It also explores the challenges experienced by these new migrants before leaving and after arriving at their destination countries and asks if and how social media mitigates these challenges. The participants consist of Nigerians who lived in the United Kingdom ( N = 18; 48.6%), Canada ( N = 5; 13.5%), the United States ( N = 10; 27%), Sweden ( N = 1; 2.7%), and France ( N = 3; 8.1%). They were aged between 26 and 48 years, with an average age of 32.5. There were 22 (59.5%) men and 15 women (40.5%) in the study. The study finds little to no evidence to support the conclusion of a more direct influence of social media on the migration decision of this Japa migration trend among the cohort interviewed. More conservative social media platforms were preferred to other, more open social networking categories. Also crucially important is the role of trust engendered by offline social network ties (including family kinship and friendship) of online influencers. The display of affluence as a motivating factor could not be conclusively established; other factors like socioeconomic, insecurity, career prospects, and unemployment were mentioned as more important. Social media applications were recognized as information-gathering tools rather than inspirational or motivational sources for the Japa migration enterprise.

Entrepreneurial orientation and SMEs export performance: The role of social media capital and business network ties

Drawing on the resource-based view (RBV) theory, the purpose of this research is to examine the influence of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) on small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) export performance with the moderating effect of social media capital and business network ties. A quantitative survey design was employed for this study. Empirical data for this paper were drawn from 369 Ghanaian SME exporting firms, using the purposive sampling technique, and the hypothesized relationships were analyzed using AMOS v.23 in structural equation modeling. The study reveals that export performance of SMEs is principally determined by their EO. In addition, this effect is reinforced by the social media capital and business network ties, exerting a positive moderating role. The paper provides practical implications for SMEs and policymakers on the need to leverage social media capital and business network ties, given their importance to improving export performance, rather than focusing solely on EO.

Role of community trust in driving brand loyalty in large online B2B communities

Purpose Online customer communities have become a strategic tool for business-to-business (B2B) firms to drive collaboration among customers around the company’s products and services. This paper aims to argue that the three social capital dimensions, that is, structural, relational and cognitive, themselves driven by brand community trust, can affect brand loyalty for the organization. Design/methodology/approach The authors use a survey to collect data and structural equation modeling to test the conceptual framework by collecting data from 214 participants across three online B2B communities operated by three technology firms in India. Findings Brand community trust is found to have a strong association with social network ties, identification and norm of reciprocity and shared vision. These three have concomitant effects on the quality of customer-to-customer (C2C) interactions. Such communication generates functional, emotional and social benefits, which, in turn, curate brand loyalty. Practical implications The authors’ findings guide community managers in leveraging such conversations in shaping customer loyalty for the corporate brand. Originality/value This work provides an integrated framework to explain the important role of C2C interactions in B2B online brand communities.