Research

My research interests lie within the field of computational social science. I am interested in applying computational and mathematical models to understand the relationship between social interactions, scientific discovery, productivity, innovation, and generosity. Additionally, I am interested in understanding how geography affects social networks.

My research within these areas includes the examination of the nature of productivity and prosocial behavior within cities, quantifying the ease of scientific discovery, and studying how people invent. In addition, I have explored the connections between the structure of linguistic networks and how language is processed in the brain. I have also studied a bit about hitting streaks in baseball.

Demographics and the Fate of the Young Scientist.
Arbesman S, Wray, KB. Social Studies of Science. 2013.

The Ascent of America’s High-Growth Companies: Founder Mobility
Maxwell, K and Arbesman S. Kauffman Foundation Report. 2012.

The rise of fractional scholarship.
Arbesman S*, Wilkins, JF*. Kauffman Foundation Report. 2012. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2048780

What Does Fortune 500 Turnover Mean?
Arbesman S*, Stangler, D. Kauffman Foundation Report. 2012. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2078162

Egocentric Social Network Structure, Health, and Pro-Social Behaviors in a National Panel Study of Americans.
O’Malley AJ*, Arbesman S*, Steiger DM, Fowler JH, Christakis NA. 2012. PLoS ONE 7(5): e36250.

Dynamic social networks promote cooperation in experiments with humans.
Rand DG*, Arbesman S*, Christakis NA. PNAS. 2011. doi:10.1073/pnas.1108243108

Eurekometrics: Analyzing the Nature of Discovery.
Arbesman S, Christakis NA. PLoS Computional Biology 7(6): e1002072. 2011. doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1002072

Geographic constraints on social network groups.
Onnela J-P*, Arbesman S*, Gonzalez MC, Barabasi AL, Christakis NA. PLoS ONE 6(4):e16939. 2011. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0016939


Scaling of prosocial behavior in cities .
Arbesman S, Christakis NA. Physica A 390(11):2155-2159. 2011.

The Life-Spans of Empires.
Arbesman S. Historical Methods: A Journal of Quantitative and Interdisciplinary History 4 (3): 127-129. 2011. doi:10.1080/01615440.2011.577733

Quantifying the ease of scientific discovery.
Arbesman S. Scientometrics 86(2):245. 2011. Available on the arXiv: 0912.1567 [Physics and Society].

A Scientometric Prediction of the Discovery of the First Potentially Habitable Planet with a Mass Similar to Earth.
Arbesman S and Laughlin G. PLoS ONE 5(10): e13061. 2010. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0013061. Also available on the arXiv: 1009.2212 [Earth and Planetary Astrophysics].

Differentiating Skill and Luck in Financial Markets with Streaks.
Mauboussin A and Arbesman S. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1664031 (August 23, 2010).

Leadership Insularity: A New Measure of Connectivity Between Central Nodes in Networks.
Arbesman S and Christakis NA. Connections 30(1): 4-10. 2010. [Leadership Insularity code]

Comparative analysis of networks of phonologically similar words in English and Spanish.
Arbesman S, Strogatz SH and Vitevitch MS. Entropy 12(3): 327-337. 2010.

The Structure of Phonological Networks Across Multiple Languages.
Arbesman, S, S. Strogatz and M. Vitevitch. International Journal of Bifurcations and Chaos 20(3):679-685. 2010. Available on the arXiv: 0903.0872 [Physics and Society].

Superlinear Scaling for Innovation in Cities.
Arbesman S, Kleinberg J, and Strogatz SH. Phys. Rev. E 79 (1). 2009. Available on the arXiv: 0809.4994 [Physics and Society]. Reprinted in Virtual Journal of Biological Physics Research 17 (3). 2009.

Ancient Wings: animating the evolution of butterfly wings patterns.
Arbesman S, Enthoven L, Monteiro A. BioSystems 71: 289-295. 2003. [Ancient Wings can be found here]

A Monte Carlo Approach to Joe DiMaggio and Streaks in Baseball.
Arbesman S, and Strogatz SH. arXiv: 0807.5082 [Popular Physics] (unpublished manuscript).

[* joint first authorship]