Demography and Networks

Abstract

Demographers have incorporated social network concepts and measures into contemporary demographic research as determinants of demographic behaviors; they have invoked structural properties of networks to improve descriptions of hard-to-survey populations; they have relied on network data and measures to estimate population size and parameters under conditions of sparse information. This chapter illustrates how social network concepts and models are integral to the development of explanations of fertility and migration behaviors and of population-level characterizations of demographic systems. It highlights productive ways for advancing demographic research that rely on the adoption of a wider array of network data and tools to link structural characteristics of networks to the mechanisms involved in shaping demographic behavior, understand how demographic behaviors structure networks, and map social network structures in data collection for more efficient and cost-effective population enumeration and parameter estimation.