Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Emergence of Disciplinary Networks

标题：学科网络的出现这个项目利用法国神经学的出现来研究社会网络是如何围绕新兴的调查领域形成的，最终将它们从想法转变为机构。是什么导致了医学研究人员之间密集的关系社区与一套新颖的想法保持一致，这种耦合过程在不同的关系类型中可能会有什么不同？法国神经学的案例是回答这些问题的理想案例，因为它的从业者之间的关系结构很好地代表了19世纪法国其他新兴学科的结构，以及更广泛的新兴领域。该项目旨在重建1840年至1900年间法国医学家之间的学徒制、同事制、合著制和交流网络，并确定产生这些后来成为神经学家的个人之间关系结构的机制。数据收集自位于法国巴黎的档案馆，并使用统计网络和文本分析来解决研究问题。该项目旨在解释为什么研究人员集体定位于将特定的开创性想法制度化。目前关于《科学》中的社交网络的大多数工作只考察了联合发表或联合引用网络，这使得人们无法解释学科的出现。本研究的学科网络理论框架对科学社会学起到了重要的推动作用，同时也提出了社会网络分析的两个核心领域。焦点是网络的关键组织者，这项研究阐明了新兴焦点影响社交网络的过程。此外，尽管网络科学中的许多研究调查了科学社区的结构，但它忽略了研究人员的想法和其他属性，以及他们之间通常存在的大量关系是如何结合到一门新学科的基础上的。从关系数据中发现社会群体的能力是网络科学家正在开发的最活跃的领域之一，但不存在准确捕捉网络中个人特征如何生成社区结构的模型。这项研究将揭示产生社区结构的机制。我的项目的结果还将阐明在不同的社交网络之间产生关系的机制。

Title: The Emergence of Disciplinary NetworksThis project uses the emergence of neurology in France to investigate how social networks form around emerging areas of inquiries, ultimately transitioning them from idea to institution. What leads to the alignment of a dense community of relationships among medical researchers with a novel set of ideas, and how might this coupling process differ among relationship types? The case of French neurology is an ideal one with which to answer these questions because the structure of relationships among its practitioners well represents that of other nascent disciplines in 19th century France and emerging fields more generally. The project aims to reconstruct apprenticeship, colleagueship, co-authorship, and communication networks among French medical scientists between 1840 and 1900 and to identify the mechanisms that generated the structure of relationships among those individuals who would become neurologists. Data are collected from archives located in Paris, France, and statistical network and text analyses are used in order to address the research questions.This project aims to explain why researchers collectively orient themselves toward institutionalizing particular groundbreaking ideas. Most current work on social networks in science only examines co-publication or co-citation networks, which leaves one unable to explain disciplinary emergence. The disciplinary network theoretical framework of this research advances sociology of science in a key way.At the same time, it advances two central areas in social network analysis. Foci serve as critical organizers of networks, and this research illuminates the process through which emerging foci come to affect social networks. Further, while much research innetwork science of science investigates the structure of scientific communities, it neglects how ideas, and other attributes of researchers, as well as the multitude of relationships that usually exist between them cohere into the foundations of a new discipline.The ability to detect social groups from relationship data constitutes one of the most active areas being developed by network scientists, but no models exist that accurately capture how traits of individuals within networks generate community structure. This research will uncover the mechanisms that produce community structure. The results of my projectwill also shed light on the mechanisms that generate relationships among distinct social networks.