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Miller McPherson, Professor

Miller McPherson
  Short Description of Research Approach:
Miller McPherson
Professor
Office Info
Office: 348B Soc/Psych
Phone: 919-660-5787
Email Address:   send me a message
Fax:
Office hrs:
 
Other Links
Curriculum Vita
 
Areas of Interest: 
Organizations,
Associations,
Social Networks,
Quantitative Methodology
 
Most of my research focuses on voluntary groups and the social networks that draw people into and out of them. But my research agenda is more ambitious than that. I think that the general ecological theory of affiliation that I have developed shows how any social entity that spreads through networks behaves. We’ve already applied the theory to occupations, musical tastes, religious congregations, voluntary organizations and other social groups. Now I am working on applying it to fuzzier cultural entities like attitudes, beliefs and social identities. I think that the theory will explain some important things about the behavior of virtually any social characteristic. 
  Selected Publications/Recent Research:
 
  • Lynn Smith-Lovin and Jeff Smith, "Social Distance in America: Heterogeneity and Homophily in Sex, Age, Education and Religion", R&R at ASR, resubmission January (in progress).
  • Networks and Niches in an Ecology of Affiliation, Book manuscript in preparation, describing results of Ten Towns Study and new data from the 2004 General Social Survey modules on volunary association and social networks. (2010).
  • Lynn Smith-Lovin and Matthew Brashears, Models and marginals: Using survey evidence to study social networks, American Sociological Review, vol. 74 no. 3 (2009), pp. 670-81.
  • Lynn Smith-Lovin and Matthew Brashears, "the ties that bind are fraying.", Contexts, vol. 7 no. 3 (2008), pp. 32-6.
  • Jeff Smith and Lynn Smith-lovin, "Social Isolation", in Encyclopedia of Human Relationships, edited by Harry Reis and Susan Sprecher (2008).
 
  Course Descriptions


 
     
       
    Sociology
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