The Analysis of Social Interaction Data

Abstract

A nonparametric technique is presented that is appropriate for comparing two social interaction matrices, either when both are obtained empirically, or when one is generated from some given theoretical position. Depending on whether the diagonals of the matrices are considered relevant to the analysis, the com parison can be carried out using some variation on a cross-product statistic. In all cases, the chosen index is referred to an exact (or approrimate) permutation dis tribution, based on the random matching of the rows and columns of one matrix to those of a second. Several examples are provided along with formulas for the first two moments of the permutation distributions for the suggested indices.