Research Article
The Topological Characteristics and Community Structure in Consumer-Service Bipartite Graph
@INPROCEEDINGS{10.1007/978-3-642-02466-5_62, author={Lin Li and Bao-Yan Gu and Li Chen}, title={The Topological Characteristics and Community Structure in Consumer-Service Bipartite Graph}, proceedings={Complex Sciences. First International Conference, Complex 2009, Shanghai, China, February 23-25, 2009. Revised Papers, Part 1}, proceedings_a={COMPLEX PART 1}, year={2012}, month={5}, keywords={bipartite graph consumer demand topological features community structure weighted network}, doi={10.1007/978-3-642-02466-5_62} }- Lin Li
Bao-Yan Gu
Li Chen
Year: 2012
The Topological Characteristics and Community Structure in Consumer-Service Bipartite Graph
COMPLEX PART 1
Springer
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-642-02466-5_62
Abstract
We apply network analysis to study bipartite consumer- service graph that represents service transaction to understand consumer demand. Based on real-world computer log files of a library, we found that consumer graph projected from bipartite graph deviates significantly from theoretical predictions based on random bipartite graph. We observed smaller-than-expected average degree, larger-than-expected average path length and stronger-than-expected tendency to cluster. These findings motivated to explore the community structure of the network. As a result, the weighted consumer network showed significant community structure than the unweighted network. Communities picked out by the algorithm revealed that individuals in the same community were due to their common specialties or the overlapping structure of knowledge between their specialties.