Temporal dynamics and network analysis

Abstract

Summary1. Network analysis is widely used in diverse fields and can be a powerful framework for studying the structure of biological systems. Temporal dynamics are a key issue for many ecological and evolutionary questions. These dynamics include both changes in network topology and flow on the network. Network analyses that ignore or do not adequately account for the temporal dynamics can result in inappropriate inferences. 2. We suggest that existing methods are currently under-utilized in many ecological and evolutionary network analyses and that the broader incorporation of these methods will considerably advance the current field. Our goal is to introduce ecologists and evolutionary biologists interested in studying network dynamics to extant ideas and methodological approaches, at a level appropriate for those new to the field. 3. We present an overview of time-ordered networks, which provide a framework for analysing network dynamics that addresses multiple inferential issues and permits novel types of temporally informed network analyses. We review available methods and software, discuss the utility and considerations of different approaches, provide a worked example analysis and highlight new research opportunities in ecology and evolutionary biology.

Social dynamics, network structure, and information diffusion in fish shoals.

“…Furthermore, if acquiring a trait changes an individual's interaction patterns, then a social network constructed prior to when an individual acquired a trait might not accurately reflect its social relationships after trait acquisition. A model allowing for a dynamic network that can change over time might be more appropriate in this context (e.g., Blonder et al, 2012). New approaches are being developed that could help address some of these shortcomings; we will discuss a few of them-e.g., Markov chain models, dynamic networks-later in the review.…”

“…Despite widespread recognition of this fact, the dynamics of network topology have generally been neglected in the behavioral ecology literature (Blonder et al, 2012;Hobson et al, 2013;Pinter-Wollman et al, 2014). Most studies are based on a single, static network constructed from observed interactions and associations accumulated over some time span-i.e., a time-aggregated network.…”

“…What's more, network processes and topological changes to network structure might occur over similar timescales and interact with each other in feedback loops. Knowledge of the temporal sequence of interactions is particularly important if one suspects that such feedback loops are at work (Blonder et al, 2012). For example, an animal that becomes infected with parasites might modify its behavior, or others might modify their behavior toward it by attempting to avoid that individual; these changes influence the subsequent likelihood of disease transmission through the population (e.g., Croft et al, 2011).…”

“…Cooperation might be more likely in the presence of eavesdroppers, especially if those eavesdroppers are well connected. Development of dynamic network models-e.g., time-ordered networks (Blonder et al, 2012)-should shed some light on these questions by allowing us to examine how individuals shift their behavior based on social context and "rewire" their network connections over time.…”

“…This sort of feedback has been modeled using "adaptive" or "coevolutionary" networks (Gross & Blasius, 2008), but has rarely been addressed in empirical studies on animal groups. Reciprocal feedbacks between network structure and flow dynamics might be best analyzed via time-ordered network models (Blonder et al, 2012;Pinter-Wollman et al, 2014).…”