Modeling the role of relationship fading and breakup in social network formation

TL;DR

This paper investigates how different mechanisms of relationship fading and breakup influence social network structure, finding that link deletion better explains empirical network features than link aging.

Contribution

It introduces a social network formation model incorporating both link aging and deletion, revealing the dominant role of link deletion in network organization.

Findings

Link deletion reproduces empirical network distributions more accurately.

Networks with link aging are more modular and homogeneously weighted.

Link deletion leads to structures that better match real-world social networks.

Abstract

In social networks of human individuals, social relationships do not necessarily last forever as they can either fade gradually with time, resulting in link aging, or terminate abruptly, causing link deletion, as even old friendships may cease. In this paper, we study a social network formation model where we introduce several ways by which a link termination takes place. If we adopt the link aging, we get a more modular structure with more homogeneously distributed link weights within communities than when link deletion is used. By investigating distributions and relations of various network characteristics, we find that the empirical findings are better reproduced with the link deletion model. This indicates that link deletion plays a more prominent role in organizing social networks than link aging.