Mediation and internal subgroup hostility are processes in signed networks that cannot be described using standard structural balance. Formalizing these ideas leads to the relaxed structural balance blockmodel as a proper generalization of structural balance blockmodels. Some formal properties concerning the relation between these two models are presented along with the properties of the fitting method proposed for the new blockmodel type. The new method is applied to four empirical data sets where improved fits with more nuanced interpretations are obtained.
COBISS.SI-ID: 28121181
Approach to partitioning signed two-mode networks is presented in the paper. The blockmodel structure for signed two-mode networks has positive and negative blocks, that can be located anywhere in the block model. We provide a motivating example and then use the new blockmodel type to delineate the voting patterns of the Supreme Court justices for all of their nonunanimous decisions for the 2006–07 term. Interpretations are presented together with a statement of further problems meriting attention for partitioning signed two-mode data.
COBISS.SI-ID: 28429661
The paper deals with general extension of fixed mixed method design by introducing a flexible feedback-loop so that several phases can be combined in a flexible order. In practice, such designs are now increasingly feasible within an information-communication technology environment, where online respondents are readily available for immediate participation. The design is based on theoretical premises of iterative integration of qualitative and quantitative methods. A new design is proposed FOMM (flexible online mixed methods design).
COBISS.SI-ID: 27232093
In the paper two common approaches for measuring social networks, the simpler and cheaper role relation approach and the more complex and complete, but also more time consuming and more expensive name generator approach are compared. Typologies of social support networks are produced by hierarchical clustering on the basis of network composition, estimated by both approaches. The results show that the overall stability of typologies is relatively high. The characteristics of the incorrectly classified respondents probably reflect the specific characteristics of the sampling procedure.
COBISS.SI-ID: 28666205
In the paper a very general approach to cluster attribute and relational data is given. The optimizational approach to the clustering problem can be applied to a variety of very interesting clustering problems by an appropriate specification of the criterion function and by the definition of the set of feasible clusterings. Both the blockmodeling problem and the clustering with the relational constraint problem are such cases. It also opens many new developments in these areas.
COBISS.SI-ID: 28666973