Social Networks with Unobserved Links

Arthur Lewbel, Xi Qu and Xun Tang

No 1004, Boston College Working Papers in Economics from Boston College Department of Economics

Abstract: We point identify and estimate linear social network models without observing any network links. The required data consist of many small networks of individuals, such as classrooms or villages, with individuals that are each only observed once. We apply our estimator to data from Tennessee's Student/Teacher Achievement Ratio (STAR) Project. Without observing the latent network in each classroom, we identify and estimate peer and contextual effects on students' performance in mathematics. We find that peer effects tend to be larger in bigger classes, and that increasing peer effects would significantly improve students' average test scores.

Keywords: Social networks; Peer effects; Unobserved network; Classroom performance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C31 C51 I21 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019-07-30, Revised 2022-07-15
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ecm, nep-net, nep-soc and nep-ure
Note: previously circulated as "Social Networks with Misclassified or Unobserved Links"
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Social Networks with Unobserved Links (2023)
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