No inventor is an island: social connectedness and the geography of knowledge flows in the US

Andreas Diemer and Tanner Regan

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: Do informal social ties connecting inventors across distant places promote knowledge flows between them? To measure informal ties, we use a new and direct index of social connectedness of regions based on aggregate Facebook friendships. We use a well-established identification strategy that relies on matching inventor citations with citations from examiners. Moreover, we isolate the specific effect of informal connections, above and beyond formal professional ties (co-inventor networks) and geographic proximity. We identify a significant and robust effect of informal ties on patent citations. Further, we find that the effect of geographic proximity on knowledge flows is entirely explained by informal social ties and professional networks. We also show that the effect of informal social ties on knowledge flows is greater for new entrepreneurs or ‘garage inventors’, for older or ‘forgotten’ patents, and for flows across distant technology fields. It has also become increasingly important over the last two decades.

Keywords: diffusion; informal networks; knowledge flows; social connectedness; PhD Studentship (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O33 R12 Z13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 25 pages
Date: 2022-03-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo, nep-ino, nep-net, nep-soc, nep-tid and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Published in Research Policy, 1, March, 2022, 51(2). ISSN: 0048-7333

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http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/113337/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: No inventor is an island: Social connectedness and the geography of knowledge flows in the US (2022)
Working Paper: No inventor is an island: social connectedness and the geography of knowledge flows in the US (2020)
Working Paper: No inventor is an island: social connectedness and the geography of knowledge flows in the US (2020)
Working Paper: No inventor is an island: social connectedness and the geography of knowledge flows in the US (2020)
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