preprint version "Globalisation in science in 2005"

[David E. Wojick]

Loet (and all),

This study is very interesting in the context of my http://www.osti.gov/science.world/ project. But on a tangential note, your mention of strong and weak links brings up a basic question about network analysis, about which I know little. 

I have a conceptual model of science diffusion in which the basic element is the "information transaction." This is basically one person getting information from another. My reading your paper for example. Note that transactions have quantity as well, such as reading your email, your abstract, part of your paper, all of it, etc.

My first question is, does every initial transaction between two people, no matter how slight, establish a link in the network? The alternative might be that certain thresholds of interaction must apply, such as co-authorship or citation. My second question is, do you think that the strength of a link might usefully be measured by the amount of information that passes between the people linked?

If these issues are already discussed in the literature I shall be happy to look at it. It is important because the vast majority of transactions cannot be observed, just as in other cases of diffusion.

Best regards,
David

At 04:11 AM 2/27/2007, you wrote:
>Adminstrative info for SIGMETRICS (for example unsubscribe): http://web.utk.edu/~gwhitney/sigmetrics.html 
>
><http://www.leydesdorff.net/cswagner07/index.htm>Globalisation in the network of science in 2005:
>
><http://www.leydesdorff.net/cswagner07/index.htm>The diffusion of international collaboration and the formation of a core group
>
><http://www.leydesdorff.net/cswagner07/Globalisation.pdf>
>[]
><http://www.leydesdorff.net/cswagner07/Globalisation.pdf><click here for pdf>
>
>Caroline S. Wagner
>
>SRI International, Arlington, Virginia, 22209, USA
>
>Caroline.wagner at sri.com; http://www.cswagner.net
>
> 
>
>Loet Leydesdorff
>
>University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
>
>Kloveniersburgwel 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam, The Netherlands
>
> 
>
>International collaboration as measured by co-authorships on refereed papers grew significantly from 1990 to 2005. International communications in science can best be studied as a network, since there is no political institution mediating relationships at that level: links self-organize largely through contacts made by scientists. As such, science at the international level shares features with other complex adaptive systems whose order arises from the interactions of hundreds of agents pursuing self-interested strategies. Communications at the international level appears to have grown significantly in the 1990s, with the addresses of many more countries evident in collaborative articles. By 2005, global communications appear to have reinforced the formation of a core group of highly cooperative countries. This core group can be expected to use knowledge from the global network with great efficiency, since these countries have strong national systems. Countries at the periphery may be disadvantaged by the strength of the core.
> 
>
>----------
>Loet Leydesdorff 
>Amsterdam School of Communications Research (ASCoR)
>Kloveniersburgwal 48, 1012 CX Amsterdam
>Tel.: +31-20- 525 6598; fax: +31-20- 525 3681 
><mailto:loet at leydesdorff.net>loet at leydesdorff.net ; http://www.leydesdorff.net/ 
> 
>Now available: <http://www.universal-publishers.com/book.php?method=ISBN&book=1581129378>The Knowledge-Based Economy: Modeled, Measured, Simulated. 385 pp.; US$ 18.95 
><http://www.universal-publishers.com/book.php?method=ISBN&book=1581126956>The Self-Organization of the Knowledge-Based Society; <http://www.universal-publishers.com/book.php?method=ISBN&book=1581126816>The Challenge of Scientometrics
> 
> 
> 
>
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