Friending

This article interrogates and examines the community of Luke and the ambivalence of the location, composition, and identity problematics issues through the Social Identity Complexity perspective (SIC hereafter). The fundamental questions which this article seeks to grapple with are: Was the community of Luke Corinth, Ephesus, or Antioch? Which social boundary markers were erected among the multiple and complex social groups within the community of Luke? The arguments in this article are framed by insights from the Social Identity Complexity Theory which was developed by Roccas and Brewer (2002). The SIC perspective is useful and relevant in re-reading and problematizing identity markers of the numerous social groups within the community of Luke. The article also explores a significant aspect of the troubled composition of the social groups in the community of Luke. This study established that there are multiple and complex social identity formations in Luke's community. Furthermore, the social identities of the members of the Lukan community were fluid, nuanced, and troubled, as highlighted in the discussion in this article.

This paper presents a novel theoretical conceptualization of football clubs and empirical evidence as to how supporter groups, owners, and others engaged to resolve threats to their club. We use boundary theory to understand the evolution of two football clubs’ ownership, financing, and governance structures and demonstrate how the blurring of club boundaries was linked to engagements in interface areas between the club and other social groups. We argue that the appropriateness of different combinations of ownership, financing, and governance practices should be evaluated in terms of how they support effective engagement spaces that negotiate relationships with codependent social groups. Conceptualizing football clubs as boundary objects provides some specific insights into changes observed in Scottish football clubs. However, this approach is relevant to other situations in which club success is dependent on cooperative engagements with multiple social groups that have both convergent and divergent interests in the club.

Relational altruism and giving in social groups

We present two studies that examine the effects of guanxi on multiple social groups from the perspective of Chinese business people. Study 1 (N = 203) tests the difference in perceived effects of six guanxi contextualizations. Study 2 (N = 195) examines the duality of guanxi as either helpful or harmful to social groups, depending on the contextualization. Findings suggest guanxi may result in positive as well as negative outcomes for focal actors and the aggregate.

Link prediction in social networks has a long history in complex network research area. The formation of links in networks has been approached by scientists from different backgrounds, ranging from physics to computer science. To predict the formation of new links, we consider measures which originate from network science and use them in the place of mass and distance within the formalism of Newton’s Gravitational Law. The attraction force calculated in this way is treated as a proxy for the likelihood of link formation. In particular, we use three different measures of vertex centrality as mass, and 13 dissimilarity measures including shortest path and inverse Katz score in place of distance, leading to over 50 combinations that we evaluate empirically. Combining these through gravitational law allows us to couple popularity with similarity, two important characteristics for link prediction in social networks. Performance of our predictors is evaluated using Area Under the Precision–Recall Curve (AUC) for seven different real-world network datasets. The experiments demonstrate that this approach tends to outperform the setting in which vertex similarity measures like Katz are used on their own. Our approach also gives us the opportunity to combine network’s global and local properties for predicting future or missing links. Our study shows that the use of the physical law which combines node importance with measures quantifying how distant the nodes are, is a promising research direction in social link prediction.

This paper investigates the multicast capacity of static wireless social networks. We adopt the two-layer network model, which includes the social layer and the networking layer. In the social layer, the social group size of each source node is modeled as power-law distribution. Moreover, the rank-based model is utilized to describe the relation between source and destinations in the networking layer. Based on the two-layer network model, the probability density function (PDF) of the destination positions is analyzed and verified by numerical simulation, which is different from the traditional ad hoc networks. According to the PDF, the bound of the network capacity is derived, and we propose a Euclidean minimum-spanning-tree-based transmission scheme, which is proved to achieve the order of capacity bound for most cases. Finally, the capacity of social networks is compared to the traditional multicast ad hoc networks, which indicates that the capacity scaling performs better in social networks than traditional ones. To our best knowledge, this is the first work of analyzing the impact on the capacity of social relation and group size in multicast ad hoc networks for the rank-based model.

Tracking how correlated ideas flow within and across multiple social groups facilitates the understanding of the transfer of information, opinions, and thoughts on social media. In this paper, we present IdeaFlow, a visual analytics system for analyzing the lead-lag changes within and across pre-defined social groups regarding a specific set of correlated ideas, each of which is described by a set of words. To model idea flows accurately, we develop a random-walk-based correlation model and integrate it with Bayesian conditional cointegration and a tensor-based technique. To convey complex lead-lag relationships over time, IdeaFlow combines the strengths of a bubble tree, a flow map, and a timeline. In particular, we develop a Voronoi-treemap-based bubble tree to help users get an overview of a set of ideas quickly. A correlated-clustering-based layout algorithm is used to simultaneously generate multiple flow maps with less ambiguity. We also introduce a focus+context timeline to explore huge amounts of temporal data at different levels of time granularity. Quantitative evaluation and case studies demonstrate the accuracy and effectiveness of IdeaFlow.

Social group size may affect the potential for sperm competition, and this in turn may favour ontogenetic adjustments in testicular mass according to the likely requirements for sperm and spermatophore production. In a number of comparative analyses of testis mass among vertebrate species that differ in mating system or social organization, increasing potential for sperm competition is associated with larger testis size. Intraspecific phenotypic plasticity should be able to produce the same pattern if social group size is heterogenous and reflects differing degrees of average sperm competition, but this intraspecific effect is less well studied. We tested the effect of social groups on both male and female investment in the simultaneously hermaphroditic leech, Helobdella papillornata. Leeches were placed in groups of one, two, four or eight. Sexual investment at the onset of reproductive maturity was quantified as the total testisac volume for male function and total egg volume for female function. We found that testisac volume (statistically adjusted for body size) showed a significant increase with increasing group size. Total egg volume (also adjusted for body size) was unaffected by group size. Our findings indicate adaptive developmental plasticity in male gonad investment in response to the potential for sperm competition.

Assessing multiple dimensions of distributional justice: Access, biodiversity and landscape structure of green spaces for multiple social groups of the Metropolitan Region of Santiago de Chile

Primates, as long-lived, iteroparous, socially complex mammals, offer the opportunity to assess the effects of behavior and demography on genetic structure. Because it is difficult to obtain tissue samples from wild primate populations, research in this area has largely been confined to terrestrial and semi-terrestrial old world monkeys (e.g., rhesus and Japanese macaques, vervets and several subspecies of baboons). However, these species display a multi-male, multi-female social structure commonly found in many other primate and non-primate mammals. Electrophoretic analyses of blood proteins from individually recognized and/or marked wild Himalayan rhesus monkeys, themselves the subject of long-term behavioral and demographic research, have begun to reveal the genetic consequences of such phenomena as social group fission, male-limited dispersion, non-consanguineous mating patterns, and agonistically defined male dominance. Specifically, rhesus social groups, consisting primarily of clusters of maternal relatives, appear to be non-random samples of a population's genotypes and genes. The genetic effects of social group fission are highly dependent on each group's size, demographic structure, and average degree of relatedness. In all cases fission contributes to the degree of intergroup genetic differentiation. Male-limited dispersion appears both to retard genetic differentiation between social groups and to lead to mating patterns that result in an avoidance of consanguinity. Groups, therefore, appear to be genetically outbred. Comparing these results with studies of other free-ranging or wild cercopithecines allows several generalizations: (a) genetic variation seems to be evenly distributed throughout each local population of multi-male social groups; (b) social groups, however, because they contain clusters of relatives, are distinctive in their specific frequencies of genes; (c) the degree of genetic differentiation between a population's social groups, because of the effects of social group fission and non-deterministic forms of male dispersal, is somewhat greater than expected on the basis of migration rates alone; and (d) the asymmetrical pattern of dispersion with respect to sex effectively precludes inbreeding in any one social group or the population as a whole. These observations have important implications for understanding the unusually rapid rates of evolution among the primates.

Flood risk management is shaped by complex feedbacks between hydrological processes and social responses, yet many existing sociohydrological models treat society as a homogeneous entity. This study develops a hierarchical sociohydrological model that explicitly represents socioeconomic heterogeneity by incorporating multiple disaster-vulnerable social groups. The study area is divided into three groups based on topography and socioeconomic characteristics, and group-specific dynamics are modeled by accounting for population movements within and beyond the region, as well as differences in flood memory loss, preparedness levels, and mobility. Key model parameters are estimated using household survey data collected in San Mateo City, the Philippines. Using this empirically grounded model, we evaluate the impacts of alternative flood management strategies through numerical simulations, focusing on variations in levee height and the frequency of disaster preparedness education. The model is applied to contrasting policy scenarios with and without levee protection to assess their differential effects on flood losses across social groups. The results reveal that under a no-levee scenario, flood losses become increasingly uneven over time, with widening disparities among social groups, indicating the amplification of social inequality. In contrast, levee-based scenarios reduce inter-group disparities in cumulative flood losses; however, they also lead to substantially larger losses per event when extreme floods occur. These findings highlight a trade-off between reducing chronic inequality and increasing vulnerability to rare but catastrophic events. By explicitly integrating socioeconomic heterogeneity into sociohydrological modeling, this study demonstrates the importance of distributional analysis in flood risk assessment and adaptation planning. The proposed framework provides a quantitative basis for evaluating equity–efficiency trade-offs in flood management policies and supports the design of more just and effective flood adaptation strategies.

A survey of specific parasites in fecal samples randomly collected from socially housed rhesus monkeys was done over a 1‐year period. Differences in frequency of samples with parasites, and number of different species per sample, were assessed by social group composition, social group size, female reproductive status, and season of the year. Common parasites were Entamoeba coli, Iodamoeba bütschlii, Balantidium coli, Strongyloides fülleborni, and Trichuris trichiura. Samples from juvenile/subadult groups had more species of potentially pathogenic parasites per sample but fewer species of nonpathogenic parasites per sample than samples from adult groups. When group size reached 12 to 16 animals, the number of samples with helminths doubled. Samples collected from groups with gestating/ lactating females had more species of nonpathogenic parasites than samples collected from groups with cycling or noncycling females. Fewer samples collected in the spring had helminths than samples collected during the fall, winter, and summer. The number of potentially pathogenic species present per sample was highest during the summer. Following anthelminthic treatment, the number of helminthic species present per sample and the number of samples with helminths remained low, then began increasing after 2 to 3 months. The number of potentially pathogenic species per sample decreased while animals were fed an inadvertently vitamin C deficient chow. © 1992 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.

Ethnic and American identity, as well as positivity and negativity toward multiple social groups, were assessed in 392 children attending 2nd or 4th grade in various New York City neighborhoods. Children from 5 ethnic groups were recruited, including White and Black Americans, as well as recent immigrants from China, the Dominican Republic, and the former Soviet Union. For ethnic minority children, greater positivity bias (evaluating one's ingroup more positively than outgroups) was predicted by immigrant status and ethnic identity, whereas negativity bias (evaluating outgroups more negatively than one's ingroup) was associated with increased age, immigrant status, and (among 4th graders only) ethnic identity. In addition, a more central American identity was associated with less intergroup bias among ethnic minority children.

Landscape topography and the mobility of individuals will have fundamental impacts on a species' population structure, for example by enhancing or reducing gene flow and therefore influencing the effective size and genetic diversity of the population. However, social organization will also influence population genetic structure. For example, species that live and breed in cooperative groups may experience high levels of inbreeding and strong genetic drift. The western pebble-mound mouse (Pseudomys chapmani), which occupies a highly heterogeneous, semi-arid landscape in Australia, is an enigmatic social mammal that has the intriguing behaviour of working cooperatively in groups to build permanent pebble mounds above a subterranean burrow system. Here, we used both nuclear (microsatellite) and mitochondrial (mtDNA) markers to analyse the range-wide population structure of western pebble-mound mice sourced from multiple social groups. We observed high levels of genetic diversity at the broad scale, very weak genetic differentiation at a finer scale and low levels of inbreeding. Our genetic analyses suggest that the western pebble-mound mouse population is both panmictic and highly viable. We conclude that high genetic connectivity across the complex landscape is a consequence of the species' ability to permeate their environment, which may be enhanced by "boom-bust" population dynamics driven by the semi-arid climate. More broadly, our results highlight the importance of sampling strategies to infer social structure and demonstrate that sociality is an important component of population genetic structure.

ABSTRACTSmart electric grids add digital technologies to the grid. While some suggest that they offer many environmental and social benefits, others remain critical and call them a neoliberal project. Considering smart grids a boundary object [Star, Susan L., and James R. Griesemer. 1989. “Institutional Ecology, Translations and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley’s Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907–39.” Social Studies of Science 19 (3): 387–420], I examine how multiple social groups come together in cooperation and conflict in the installation of one smart grid. In what follows, I first argue that participation is Gramscian common sense (1971), a taken-for-granted good in producing a smart grid. Gramsci points out that common sense can be used to reinforce oppressive ideologies of a hegemonic status quo, but that it also contains “good sense” that can be developed into counter-hegemonic narratives and movements. Second, I argue that in the course of cooperation and conflict, the smart grid indeed becomes more neoliberal, and this occurs through participation. While the utility often seeks or accepts public participation, the meaning of participation gradually becomes limited to individualistic and financially motivated “choice.” In the discussed case, many of the (less neoliberal) social and environmental benefits of the grid and more collectivist forms of participation were precluded. This article offers a grounded examination of a smart grid and a sympathetic critique of common-sense participation.