Journal article discussion

1. Social Network Structures in
Online Communities
Steve Geer & Sreyoshi Dey
COM 600 Journal Article Presentation
Fall 2015

2. OVERVIEW
➢ Online groups are structured in many different ways,
creating varying degrees of interconnectedness and
separation (Ganley and Lampe, 2009).
➢ Flow of information, efficiency, and overall group (or
corporate) cohesion all depend on a well-structured
network (Ganley and Lampe, 2009).

3. and countless more….
ONLINE COMMUNITIES
Logos gathered through Google search

4. Some key terms and concepts essential to the
understanding of networking in online
communities:
• Social network theory
• Social capital
• Structural holes
• Brokerage vs closure
• Between-ness vs constraint

5. Let’s first review the Social Network
Theory a little...
Video 1: Network Theory by Marc Samet, YouTube

6. SOCIAL CAPITAL
 It is the value of one’s social network, or structure of
relationships and one’s position within it, there on the
advantage or benefits one may avail (Ganley and Lampe,
2009; Shen, Monge & Williams, 2012).
 In online communities, it is an incentive to participate.
 # of Friends or Followers, # of Likes, Shares, Karma, Klout, etc. all
are seen as measures of social capital
 The way a community is structured and managed will
affect its social capital (Granovetter, 1973; Ganley and
Lampe, 2009; Shen, Monge & Williams, 2012).

7. REPUTATION SYSTEM
•A way of achieving user feedback and
facilitating participation, legitimacy and
authority over a network and its flow of
information (Ganley and Lampe, 2009).
•A tool that changes the dynamics and
transparency of a network (Ganley and
Lampe, 2009).

8. •A concept applied to social network theory that
describes the gaps that exist between more dense
subnetworks of strong connections (Granovetter,
1973; Ganley and Lampe, 2009; Shen, Monge &
Williams, 2012).
•The way information propagates differs
based on what structural gaps exist
in the network.
•Also affects social capital.
STRUCTURAL HOLES
Figure 1: Structural hole in a relationship
(By edbrenegar.typepad.com)

9. STRUCTURAL HOLES
“Structural holes are defined as a lightly
connected bridge between denser sub-network
elements. If, in their collection of networks, an
individual has bridged one or more structural
holes they are “brokers” between the sub-
networks; at the other extreme they are
participating in “closed” networks.”
- Ganley and Lampe, 2009

10. BROKERAGE V. CLOSURE
•Brokerage: “If the structural hole is large with very
few actors crossing it, brokerage allows the entry
of new ideas across a “bridge” or “brokerage”
across sub- communities in a way that can
facilitate information flow in the larger network.”
•Closure: “...individuals with a personal network that
is highly interconnected with few structural
holes…” (Ganley and Lampe, 2009; Shen, Monge &
Williams, 2012)

11. BETWEEN-NESS V.
CONSTRAINT
•Betweenness is a measure of how many
subgroups in a network are not directly
connected to each other
•Constraint measures the interconnectivity
of subgroups or “relationship redundancy”
(Ganley and Lampe, 2009)

12. DISCUSSION QUESTION #1
•If you were to start a business that required
an online network to help facilitate and
manage operations or social media, what
service, structure and/or characteristics
would you use and why?

13. JOURNAL ARTICLE 1
THE TIES THAT BIND: SOCIAL
NETWORK PRINCIPLES IN ONLINE
COMMUNITIES
BY
DALE GANLEY AND CLIFF LAMPE (2009)

14. Slashdot.org
Figure 2 and 3: Screenshots of Slashdot.org (Ganley and
Lampe, 2009)

15. Key Results
Figure 4: Screenshots of Results (Ganley and Lampe, 2009)

16. Discussion question #2
Can you possibly think of any brokered and closed
networks from your own personal social media
networks?

17. JOURNAL ARTICLE 2
Virtual brokerage and closure: Network
structure and social capital in a
massively multiplayer online game
BY
CUIHUA SHEN, PETER MONGE & DMITRI
WILLIAMS
2012

18. What’s this study about?
• Takes a structural approach towards understanding
brokerage and closure, or bridging and bonding in
the virtual world.
• Focuses on network structure within which individual
relationships are situated.
• In terms of social media, how does one assess social
capital? Researcher’s operationalized bridging and
bonding social capital according to their expected
outcomes.

19. An industry report showed that there were 46 million
American MMO players who spent a total of 3.8 billion
dollars on MMOs in 2009.
Everquest II
Figure 5: Everquest II (8 dimensional)

20. ● Results provided strong support for the structural
model, demonstrating that players’ network
brokerage positively predicted their task
performance in the game and players embedded in
closed networks were more likely to trust each other
(Shen, Monge & Williams, 2012).
○ Brokers essentially had a wider network and
therefore better knowledge and gamed better.
○ Closed networks, where players knew each
other, fostered trust.
What did the study lead to?

21. Discussion question #3
How do you think this study can be generalized? Does it
impact your understanding of brokerage and closed
networks?
How does this resonate with the previous study?

22. References
• Ganley, D., & Lampe, C. (2009). The ties that bind: Social
network principles in online communities. Decision
Support Systems 47, 266-274.
• Granovetter, M. S. (1973). The strength of weak ties.
American journal of sociology, vol 78, no.6, 1360-1380.
• Shen, C., Monge, P., & Williams, D. (2012). Virtual
brokerage and closure: Network structure and social
capital in a massively multiplayer online game.
Communication Research, 1-22.

23. Thank You...