Korean university life in a network perspective: Dynamics of a large affiliation network

We investigate course registration data of 18 semesters at a Korean University to portray the time evolution of students' positions in the network of fellow students. Apart from being a study of the social positions of students, the present work is also an example of how large-scale, time resolved, affiliation networks can be analyzed. For example, we discuss the proper definitions of weights, and propose a redefined weighted clustering coefficient. Among other things, we find that the students enter the network at the center and are gradually diffusing towards the periphery. On the other hand, the ties to the classmates of the first semester will, on average, become stronger as time progresses. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.