title: Modeling the Role of Relationship Fading and Breakup in Social Network Formation.
abstract: In social networks of human individuals, social relationships do not necessarily last forever as they can either fade gradually with time, resulting in "link aging," or terminate abruptly, causing "link deletion," as even old friendships may cease. In this paper, we study a social network formation model where we introduce several ways by which a link termination takes place. If we adopt the link aging, we get a more modular structure with more homogeneously distributed link weights within communities than when link deletion is used. By investigating distributions and relations of various network characteristics, we find that the empirical findings are better reproduced with the link deletion model. This indicates that link deletion plays a more prominent role in organizing social networks than link aging.
authors.affiliation: RIKEN Advanced Institute for Computational Science, 7-1-26, Minatojima-minami-machi, Chuo-ku, Kobe, Hyogo, 650-0047, Japan; CREST, Japan Science and Technology Agency 4-1-8 Honcho, Kawaguchi, Saitama, 332-0012, Japan.
authors.forename: Yohsuke
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Murase
authors.affiliation: BK21plus Physics Division and Department of Physics, Pohang University of Science and Technology, Pohang 790-784, Republic of Korea; Department of Computer Science, Aalto University School of Science, P.O. Box 15500, Espoo, Finland.
authors.forename: Hang-Hyun
authors.initials: HH
authors.lastname: Jo
authors.affiliation: Department of Theoretical Physics, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, H-1111 Budapest, Hungary; Center for Network Science, Central European University, Nádor u. 9, H-1051 Budapest, Hungary.
authors.forename: János
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Török
authors.affiliation: Department of Computer Science, Aalto University School of Science, P.O. Box 15500, Espoo, Finland; Department of Theoretical Physics, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, H-1111 Budapest, Hungary; Center for Network Science, Central European University, Nádor u. 9, H-1051 Budapest, Hungary.
authors.forename: János
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kertész
authors.affiliation: Department of Computer Science, Aalto University School of Science, P.O. Box 15500, Espoo, Finland.
authors.forename: Kimmo
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kaski
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D003142:Communication; D003625:Data Collection; D033062:Friends; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D011336:Probability; D012111:Residence Characteristics; D012919:Social Behavior; D060756:Social Networking; D012944:Social Support; D013997:Time Factors