Modes of collaboration in modern science: Beyond power laws and preferential attachment

The goal of the study is to determine the underlying processes leading to the observed collaborator distribution in modern scientific fields, with special attention to non-power law behavior. Nanoscience is used as a case study of a modern interdisciplinary field, and its coauthorship network for 2000-04 period is constructed from NanoBank database. We find three collaboration modes that correspond to three distinct ranges in the distribution of collaborators: (1) for authors with fewer than 20 collaborators (the majority) preferential attachment does not hold and they form a log-normal "hook" instead of a power law, (2) authors with more than 20 collaborators benefit from preferential attachment and form a power law tail, and (3) authors with between 250 and 800 collaborators are more frequent than expected because of the hyperauthorship practices in certain subfields.

[1]  S. N. Dorogovtsev,et al.  Scaling Behaviour of Developing and Decaying Networks , 2000, cond-mat/0005050.

[2]  Colin Milburn,et al.  Nanotechnology in the Age of Posthuman Engineering: Science Fiction as Science , 2003 .

[3]  Stanley Wasserman,et al.  Social Network Analysis: Methods and Applications , 1994, Structural analysis in the social sciences.

[4]  M. Newman.  Clustering and preferential attachment in growing networks. , 2001, Physical review. E, Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics.

[5]  Stasa Milojevic.  Big science, nano science?: Mapping the evolution and socio-cognitive structure of nanoscience/nanotechnology using mixed methods , 2009 .

[6]  N. Storer,et al.  Invisible colleges. Diffusion of knowledge in scientific communities , 1972, Medicina e historia.

[7]  Diana Crane,et al.  Invisible colleges. Diffusion of knowledge in scientific communities , 1972, Medical History.

[8]  Alessandro Vespignani,et al.  Network science , 2007, Annu. Rev. Inf. Sci. Technol..

[9]  S. N. Dorogovtsev,et al.  Evolution of networks , 2001, cond-mat/0106144.

[10]  Stephen Cole,et al.  Social Stratification in Science , 1974 .

[11]  R. Merton.  The Matthew Effect in Science , 1968, Science.

[12]  W. Glänzel,et al.  Analysing Scientific Networks Through Co-Authorship , 2004 .

[13]  K. Subramanyam,et al.  Bibliometric studies of research collaboration: A review , 1983 .

[14]  Derek de Solla Price,et al.  A general theory of bibliometric and other cumulative advantage processes , 1976, J. Am. Soc. Inf. Sci..

[15]  Wolfgang Glänzel,et al.  Coauthorship Patterns and Trends in the Sciences (1980-1998): A Bibliometric Study With Implications for Database Indexing and Search Strategies , 2002, Libr. Trends.

[16]  Olle Persson,et al.  Studying research collaboration using co-authorships , 1996, Scientometrics.

[17]  J. S. Katz,et al.  What is research collaboration , 1997 .

[18]  Donald de B. Beaver,et al.  Studies in scientific collaboration Part III. Professionalization and the natural history of modern scientific co-authorship , 1979, Scientometrics.

[19]  Barry Bozeman,et al.  The Impact of Research Collaboration on Scientific Productivity , 2005 .

[20]  David M. Berube,et al.  Nano-Hype: The Truth Behind the Nanotechnology Buzz , 2005 .

[21]  Loet Leydesdorff,et al.  Network Structure, Self-Organization and the Growth of International Collaboration in Science.Research Policy, 34(10), 2005, 1608-1618. , 2005, 0911.4299.

[22]  D. Watts.  The “New” Science of Networks , 2004 .

[23]  M. Newman,et al.  The structure of scientific collaboration networks. , 2000, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[24]  J. Moody.  The Structure of a Social Science Collaboration Network: Disciplinary Cohesion from 1963 to 1999 , 2004 .

[25]  Z. Neda,et al.  Networks in life: Scaling properties and eigenvalue spectra , 2002, cond-mat/0303106.

[26]  Albert,et al.  Emergence of scaling in random networks , 1999, Science.

[27]  Blaise Cronin,et al.  Hyperauthorship: A postmodern perversion or evidence of a structural shift in scholarly communication practices? , 2001, J. Assoc. Inf. Sci. Technol..

[28]  R. Merton.  The Matthew Effect in Science, II: Cumulative Advantage and the Symbolism of Intellectual Property , 1988, Isis.

[29]  C. Wagner.  The New Invisible College: Science for Development , 2008 .

[30]  O. Persson,et al.  Understanding Patterns of International Scientific Collaboration , 1992 .

[31]  R. Rosen,et al.  PART I. THE PROFESSIONAL ORIGINS OF SCIENTIFIC CO-AUTHORSHIP , 1978 .

[32]  Jeremy P. Birnholtz,et al.  What does it mean to be an author? The intersection of credit, contribution, and collaboration in science , 2006, J. Assoc. Inf. Sci. Technol..

[33]  H. KRETSCHMER,et al.  Patterns of behaviour in coauthorship networks of invisible colleges , 1997, Scientometrics.

[34]  Michael R. Darby,et al.  Nanobank: Data Overview , 2007 .

[35]  Donald de B. Beaver,et al.  Reflections on Scientific Collaboration (and its study): Past, Present, and Future , 2001, Scientometrics.

[36]  Diane H. Sonnenwald,et al.  Scientific collaboration : Challenges and solutions , 2007 .

[37]  Harriet Zuckerman,et al.  Scientific Elite: Nobel Laureates in the United States: , 1979 .

[38]  L. Zucker,et al.  Minerva Unbound: Knowledge Stocks, Knowledge Flows and New Knowledge Production , 2006 .

[39]  Donald de B. Beaver,et al.  Studies in scientific collaboration , 2005, Scientometrics.

[40]  Tiago Moreira,et al.  Structures of Scientific Collaboration , 2009 .

[41]  M. Newman.  1 Who is the best connected scientist ? A study of scientific coauthorship networks , 2004 .

[42]  A. Barabasi,et al.  Evolution of the social network of scientific collaborations , 2001, cond-mat/0104162.

[43]  J. S. Long,et al.  Cumulative Advantage and Inequality in Science , 1982 .

[44]  Noriko Hara,et al.  An emerging view of scientific collaboration: Scientists' perspectives on collaboration and factors that impact collaboration , 2003, J. Assoc. Inf. Sci. Technol..

[45]  Henk F. Moed,et al.  Handbook of Quantitative Science and Technology Research: The Use of Publication and Patent Statistics in Studies of S&T Systems , 2004 .

[46]  Michael R. Darby,et al.  Socio-Economic Impact of Nanoscale Science: Initial Results and Nanobank , 2005 .

[47]  Mark E. J. Newman,et al.  The Structure and Function of Complex Networks , 2003, SIAM Rev..