Friendship and assistance ties of students:

effect of GPA
D.Valeeva, O.Poldin, M.Yudkevich
Center for Institutional Studies (Higher School of Economics) Moscow, Russia
XXXIII Sunbelt Social Network Conference, May 21-26, 2013, Hamburg, Germany

Main research areas of student social networks

Network as dependent variable Student characteristics
(race, sex etc.)

Network as independent variable Network effects

(peer group effects)

Network effects
(homophily, propinquity etc.)

Student abilities
(academic achievement)

DeFour & Hirsch (1990) DAugelli & Hershberger (1993) Mayer & Puller (2008) (2003)

Antrobus (1988) Thomas (2000) Sacerdote (2001) Zimmerman

Our contribution: friendship and study assistance networks p* modeling of student networks administratively formed groups Russian sample

Main network effects

Reciprocity: tendency of friendship ties to be mutual Transitivity: tendency of ties to be closed in triads (friend of my friend is also my friend) Homophily: tendency of ties to be formed between individuals with the same characteristics and abilities Propinquity: tendency of ties to be formed between individuals situated in same geographical and institutional settings Popularity: tendency of more popular and active individuals to form more toes and to be more successful

Hypotheses
About reciprocity and transitivity effects: H1. Friendship ties are more mutual than assistance ties H2. Friendship ties are more transitive than assistance ties About homophily and propinquity effects: H3. There are propinquity effects between students in study group and type of tuition (in both friendship and assistance networks) H4. There are homophily effects between students in their gender (only in friendship network) H5. There are homophily effects between students in their GPA (in both friendship and assistance networks) About popularity effects: H6. Academically successful students are more popular (in both friendship and assistance networks)

Data
Students of Economics Department in Higher School of Economics

2nd year students: 94 students

3rd year students: 118 students ~80% of the whole network is described Students from 7 study groups (administratively formed) Tuition free and full tuition students study together

Questions in the questionnaire:

1. Please indicate up to 5 of your classmates with whom you spend most of your time 2. Please indicate up to 5 of your classmates to whom you address on some educational help
+ Additional information about gender and type of tuition of students, their study group and GPA

Descriptive statistics-1

Mean No. of friendship ties No. of assistance ties GPA % of men % of tuition free students 3.49 (1.31) 3.35 (1.47) 6.89 (0.93) 37% 68%

Min 0 0 4.70

Max 5 5 9.52

No. of obs. 94 94 94 94 94

Friendship network

Assistance network

Descriptive statistics-2

Friendship network Density Reciprocity Transitivity 0.04 0.55 0.36

Assistance network 0.04 0.40 0.35

Methods
ERGM or p* => estimation of probability of tie in network
Variables: a) Network characteristics: density, reciprocity, transitivity b) Student characteristics: homophily, propinquity and popularity on gender, group, tuition, GPA

Network characteristics
Network characteristics
Reciprocity

Picture

GWESP
(geometrically weighted edgewise shared partner)

Mixed 2-star

Effects
Effects

Friendship network
Estimate(SE)

Assistance network
Estimate(SE)

Density Reciprocity Mixed 2-star Gwesp Friendship network Assistance network Homophily on gender (women) Homophily on gender (men) Propinquity on study group Propinquity on tuition (free) Propinquity on tuition (full) Abs. diff. in GPA Popularity on GPA

-2.112*

(0.895) (0.244) (0.037)

-11.971*** 1.013***

(1.249)

2.215***

(0.286) (0.026)

-0.193*** 1.231***

-0.126*** 1.131*** 3.282***

(0.120)

(0.127) (0.210)

3.205*** 0.452*

(0.199)

(0.180) (0.152) (0.129)

0.334 0.023

(0.204) (0.155) (0.158)

0.502*** 0.822*** 0.137

1.101*** 0.229 0.198

(0.154) (0.197) (0.089) (0.123)

(0.161) (0.305) (0.111) (0.163)

0.435* -0.114

-0.185+

-0.334**

1.029***

Conclusions
Reciprocity and transitivity effects: 1. Friendship ties are more mutual than assistance ties 2. There is no significant differences between networks in their transitivity measures Homophily and propinquity effects: 3. Students connections are highly defined by their study groups 4. Homophily on gender is significant only in friendship ties 5. Propinquity on tuition is significant only in friendship ties (for full tuition students) 6. Difference in GPA doesnt determine friendship or assistance ties of students Popularity effects: 7. Academically successful students are more popular (have more in-going ties) in assistance networks, but less popular in friendship networks

GOF plots for friendship network-1

GOF plots for friendship network-2

GOF plots for assistance network-1

GOF plots for assistance network-2