Geographical impacts on social networks from perspectives of space and place: an empirical study using mobile phone data
Li Shi,
Lun Wu,
Guanghua Chi and
Yu Liu ()
Additional contact information
Li Shi: Peking University
Lun Wu: Peking University
Guanghua Chi: Peking University
Yu Liu: Peking University
Journal of Geographical Systems, 2016, vol. 18, issue 4, No 3, 359-376
Abstract:
Abstract Space and place are two fundamental concepts in geography. Geographical factors have long been known as drivers of many aspects of people’s social networks. But whether and how space and place affect social networks differently are still unclear. The widespread use of location-aware devices provides a novel source for distinguishing the mechanisms of their impacts on social networks. Using mobile phone data, this paper explores the effects of space and place on social networks. From the perspective of space, we confirm the distance decay effect in social networks, based on a comparison between synthetic social ties generated by a null model and actual social ties derived from real-world data. From the perspective of place, we introduce several measures to evaluate interactions between individuals and inspect the trio relationship including distance, spatio-temporal co-occurrence, and social ties. We found that people’s interaction is a more important factor than spatial proximity, indicating that the spatial factor has a stronger impact on social networks in place compared to that in space. Furthermore, we verify the hypothesis that interactions play an important role in strengthening friendships.
Keywords: Geographical impacts; Space and place; Spatially-embedded social networks; Mobile phone data; Individuals’ interaction (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C18 D83 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)
Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10109-016-0236-8 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:jgeosy:v:18:y:2016:i:4:d:10.1007_s10109-016-0236-8
Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... ce/journal/10109/PS2
DOI: 10.1007/s10109-016-0236-8
Access Statistics for this article
Journal of Geographical Systems is currently edited by Manfred M. Fischer and Antonio Páez
More articles in Journal of Geographical Systems from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().