Status allocation is a process by which complex labor market processes allocate individuals with ... more Status allocation is a process by which complex labor market processes allocate individuals with varying credentials and background characteristics to occupational positions that vary systematically in prestige, autonomy, and compensation. Previous literature examines two principles of allocation, the meritocratic principle and the lottery or chance principle, to assess departures of an observed distribution from pure meritocratic versus pure chance distributions (Krauze and Słomczyński, 1985). In this paper, we model an observed distribution as a compound of elementary distributions, meritocratic and chance, governed by a mixing parameter that expresses, in effect, the proportion of the actual allocation attributable to one principle versus another. We generalize the constant mixing model to a differential mixing model in which the mixing parameters are origin-specific. We explore the insights our framework enables with two comprehensive data sets on educational origins and occupational destinations, one covering the EU for over 30 countries from 1992 to 2018 and the other from IPUMS for both EU and other nations. We find that the differential model typically fits better than the constant model, that mixing coefficient for the top origin category is much larger than the mixing coefficient for lower categories, that the allocation of women is generally more meritocratic than the allocation of men, that there is fluctuation over time in the degree to which an observed allocation fits a meritocratic pattern, and that countries differ widely how much meritocracy versus lottery contributes to status allocation.
2019 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics (SMC), 2019
This paper introduces a decomposition approach to address the problem of predicting different use... more This paper introduces a decomposition approach to address the problem of predicting different user activities at hour granularity over a long period of time. Our approach involves two steps. First, we used a temporal neural network ensemble to predict the number of each type of activity that occurred in a day. Second, we used a set of neural networks to assign the events to a user-repository pair in a particular hour. We focused this work on a subset of the public GitHub dataset that records the activities of over 2 million users on over 400,000 software repositories. Our experiments show we were able to predict hourly user-repo activity with reasonably low error. Our simulations are accurate for 1–3 weeks (168–504 hours) after inception, with accuracy gradually falling off. It was shown that activity on Twitter and Reddit increases the accuracy of activity prediction on GitHub for most events.
Social media environments often foster the formation of communities promoted by users’ tendencies... more Social media environments often foster the formation of communities promoted by users’ tendencies toward homophily. These tendencies of connecting with similar users are solidified by the social media companies’ algorithmic and business practices, leading to polarized networks, where communities of different interests rarely interact. This paper investigates via simulations the adoption of a new convention promoted by a persistent minority in a network polarized into two communities. We perform experiments on two real-world networks and various synthetic networks with controlled properties. We discover that the position of the persistent minority has a greater impact on spreading new conventions than its relative size. We also show that although diffusion becomes harder as network polarization increases, a persistent minority can increase its effectiveness in promoting new conventions by targeting low-influence users from the opposite community.
Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, 2023
Status allocation is a process by which complex labor market processes allocate individuals with ... more Status allocation is a process by which complex labor market processes allocate individuals with varying credentials and background characteristics to occupational positions that vary systematically in prestige, autonomy, and compensation. Previous literature examines two principles of allocation, the meritocratic principle and the lottery or chance principle, to assess departures of an observed distribution from pure meritocratic versus pure chance distributions (Krauze and Słomczyński, 1985). In this paper, we model an observed distribution as a compound of elementary distributions, meritocratic and chance, governed by a mixing parameter that expresses, in effect, the proportion of the actual allocation attributable to one principle versus another. We generalize the constant mixing model to a differential mixing model in which the mixing parameters are origin-specific. We explore the insights our framework enables with two comprehensive data sets on educational origins and occupational destinations, one covering the EU for over 30 countries from 1992 to 2018 and the other from IPUMS for both EU and other nations. We find that the differential model typically fits better than the constant model, that mixing coefficient for the top origin category is much larger than the mixing coefficient for lower categories, that the allocation of women is generally more meritocratic than the allocation of men, that there is fluctuation over time in the degree to which an observed allocation fits a meritocratic pattern, and that countries differ widely how much meritocracy versus lottery contributes to status allocation.
Expectation states theory suggests that status orders emerge in task groups via the activation of... more Expectation states theory suggests that status orders emerge in task groups via the activation of exogenous status differences and the development of endogenous behavior interchange patterns. The formal e-state model developed by Skvortez and Fararo postulates three specific mechanisms—status activation, interaction initiation, and bystander effect—that drive the emergence conceptualized as networks of complete asymmetric digraphs, also known as “tournaments.” The author assesses this model with data from three sources: 77 six-person groups in which external status differences are experimentally created to span all possible initial status combinations from one high and five low to five high and one low status actor, 31 six-person and 51 four-person groups in which status combinations leverage existing status differences in the population of subjects (gender and year in college). Overall consistency with model prediction is noted, but challenges with deep evaluation remain, and these are addressed in the final section of the chapter.
Limitations: Participants in our study are divided into two groups based on a criterion that is l... more Limitations: Participants in our study are divided into two groups based on a criterion that is likely to have been too weak to induce strong group identity. Measures that enhance the sense of group identity need to be introduced in future studies.
... Computer Simulation for Theory Development: An Evolving Component of Sociological Research Pr... more ... Computer Simulation for Theory Development: An Evolving Component of Sociological Research Programs 47 Barbara F. Meeker and Robert K. Leik ... and Shawn Donnelly Toward a Formal Theory of Equilibrium in Network Exchange Systems 303 Tadeusz Sozanski Strategy in ...
Preface 1: Macrostructural Concepts 2: Formal Theory of Population Structure 3: Testing Theoretic... more Preface 1: Macrostructural Concepts 2: Formal Theory of Population Structure 3: Testing Theoretical Implications 4: Occupational Chances 5: Structural Context and Organizations 6: Social Exchange 7: Historical Developments Bibliography Author Index Subject Index
Preface and acknowledgments 1. Introduction and overview 2. Social exchange and power 3. Punishme... more Preface and acknowledgments 1. Introduction and overview 2. Social exchange and power 3. Punishment and coercion 4. An experimental setting for studying power in exchange relations 5. The early research: experimental tests and theoretical puzzles 6. The structural determination of power use 7. Dependence and risk: structural constraints on strategic power use 8. Injustice and risk: normative constraints on strategic power use 9. The effects of coercion: compliance or conflict? 10. A theory of coercion in social exchange 11. Conclusions and implications Appendix I. Definitions of basic concepts of social exchange Appendix II. The experimental instructions for the standardized setting Notes References.
Status allocation is a process by which complex labor market processes allocate individuals with ... more Status allocation is a process by which complex labor market processes allocate individuals with varying credentials and background characteristics to occupational positions that vary systematically in prestige, autonomy, and compensation. Previous literature examines two principles of allocation, the meritocratic principle and the lottery or chance principle, to assess departures of an observed distribution from pure meritocratic versus pure chance distributions (Krauze and Słomczyński, 1985). In this paper, we model an observed distribution as a compound of elementary distributions, meritocratic and chance, governed by a mixing parameter that expresses, in effect, the proportion of the actual allocation attributable to one principle versus another. We generalize the constant mixing model to a differential mixing model in which the mixing parameters are origin-specific. We explore the insights our framework enables with two comprehensive data sets on educational origins and occupational destinations, one covering the EU for over 30 countries from 1992 to 2018 and the other from IPUMS for both EU and other nations. We find that the differential model typically fits better than the constant model, that mixing coefficient for the top origin category is much larger than the mixing coefficient for lower categories, that the allocation of women is generally more meritocratic than the allocation of men, that there is fluctuation over time in the degree to which an observed allocation fits a meritocratic pattern, and that countries differ widely how much meritocracy versus lottery contributes to status allocation.
2019 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics (SMC), 2019
This paper introduces a decomposition approach to address the problem of predicting different use... more This paper introduces a decomposition approach to address the problem of predicting different user activities at hour granularity over a long period of time. Our approach involves two steps. First, we used a temporal neural network ensemble to predict the number of each type of activity that occurred in a day. Second, we used a set of neural networks to assign the events to a user-repository pair in a particular hour. We focused this work on a subset of the public GitHub dataset that records the activities of over 2 million users on over 400,000 software repositories. Our experiments show we were able to predict hourly user-repo activity with reasonably low error. Our simulations are accurate for 1–3 weeks (168–504 hours) after inception, with accuracy gradually falling off. It was shown that activity on Twitter and Reddit increases the accuracy of activity prediction on GitHub for most events.
Social media environments often foster the formation of communities promoted by users’ tendencies... more Social media environments often foster the formation of communities promoted by users’ tendencies toward homophily. These tendencies of connecting with similar users are solidified by the social media companies’ algorithmic and business practices, leading to polarized networks, where communities of different interests rarely interact. This paper investigates via simulations the adoption of a new convention promoted by a persistent minority in a network polarized into two communities. We perform experiments on two real-world networks and various synthetic networks with controlled properties. We discover that the position of the persistent minority has a greater impact on spreading new conventions than its relative size. We also show that although diffusion becomes harder as network polarization increases, a persistent minority can increase its effectiveness in promoting new conventions by targeting low-influence users from the opposite community.
Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, 2023
Status allocation is a process by which complex labor market processes allocate individuals with ... more Status allocation is a process by which complex labor market processes allocate individuals with varying credentials and background characteristics to occupational positions that vary systematically in prestige, autonomy, and compensation. Previous literature examines two principles of allocation, the meritocratic principle and the lottery or chance principle, to assess departures of an observed distribution from pure meritocratic versus pure chance distributions (Krauze and Słomczyński, 1985). In this paper, we model an observed distribution as a compound of elementary distributions, meritocratic and chance, governed by a mixing parameter that expresses, in effect, the proportion of the actual allocation attributable to one principle versus another. We generalize the constant mixing model to a differential mixing model in which the mixing parameters are origin-specific. We explore the insights our framework enables with two comprehensive data sets on educational origins and occupational destinations, one covering the EU for over 30 countries from 1992 to 2018 and the other from IPUMS for both EU and other nations. We find that the differential model typically fits better than the constant model, that mixing coefficient for the top origin category is much larger than the mixing coefficient for lower categories, that the allocation of women is generally more meritocratic than the allocation of men, that there is fluctuation over time in the degree to which an observed allocation fits a meritocratic pattern, and that countries differ widely how much meritocracy versus lottery contributes to status allocation.
Expectation states theory suggests that status orders emerge in task groups via the activation of... more Expectation states theory suggests that status orders emerge in task groups via the activation of exogenous status differences and the development of endogenous behavior interchange patterns. The formal e-state model developed by Skvortez and Fararo postulates three specific mechanisms—status activation, interaction initiation, and bystander effect—that drive the emergence conceptualized as networks of complete asymmetric digraphs, also known as “tournaments.” The author assesses this model with data from three sources: 77 six-person groups in which external status differences are experimentally created to span all possible initial status combinations from one high and five low to five high and one low status actor, 31 six-person and 51 four-person groups in which status combinations leverage existing status differences in the population of subjects (gender and year in college). Overall consistency with model prediction is noted, but challenges with deep evaluation remain, and these are addressed in the final section of the chapter.
Limitations: Participants in our study are divided into two groups based on a criterion that is l... more Limitations: Participants in our study are divided into two groups based on a criterion that is likely to have been too weak to induce strong group identity. Measures that enhance the sense of group identity need to be introduced in future studies.
... Computer Simulation for Theory Development: An Evolving Component of Sociological Research Pr... more ... Computer Simulation for Theory Development: An Evolving Component of Sociological Research Programs 47 Barbara F. Meeker and Robert K. Leik ... and Shawn Donnelly Toward a Formal Theory of Equilibrium in Network Exchange Systems 303 Tadeusz Sozanski Strategy in ...
Preface 1: Macrostructural Concepts 2: Formal Theory of Population Structure 3: Testing Theoretic... more Preface 1: Macrostructural Concepts 2: Formal Theory of Population Structure 3: Testing Theoretical Implications 4: Occupational Chances 5: Structural Context and Organizations 6: Social Exchange 7: Historical Developments Bibliography Author Index Subject Index
Preface and acknowledgments 1. Introduction and overview 2. Social exchange and power 3. Punishme... more Preface and acknowledgments 1. Introduction and overview 2. Social exchange and power 3. Punishment and coercion 4. An experimental setting for studying power in exchange relations 5. The early research: experimental tests and theoretical puzzles 6. The structural determination of power use 7. Dependence and risk: structural constraints on strategic power use 8. Injustice and risk: normative constraints on strategic power use 9. The effects of coercion: compliance or conflict? 10. A theory of coercion in social exchange 11. Conclusions and implications Appendix I. Definitions of basic concepts of social exchange Appendix II. The experimental instructions for the standardized setting Notes References.
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Papers by John Skvoretz