Lusseau David, Newman M E J
School of Biological Sciences, University of Aberdeen, Lighthouse Field Station, Cromarty, Ross-shire IV11 8YJ, UK.
Proc Biol Sci. 2004 Dec 7;271 Suppl 6(Suppl 6):S477-81. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2004.0225.
Techniques recently developed for the analysis of human social networks are applied to the social network of bottlenose dolphins living in Doubtful Sound, New Zealand. We identify communities and subcommunities within the dolphin population and present evidence that sex- and age-related homophily play a role in the formation of clusters of preferred companionship. We also identify brokers who act as links between sub-communities and who appear to be crucial to the social cohesion of the population as a whole. The network is found to be similar to human social networks in some respects but different in some others, such as the level of assortative mixing by degree within the population. This difference elucidates some of the means by which the network forms and evolves.
最近开发的用于分析人类社交网络的技术被应用于生活在新西兰达特茅斯峡湾的宽吻海豚的社交网络。我们识别出了海豚群体中的群落和亚群落，并提供证据表明与性别和年龄相关的同质性在形成偏好陪伴集群中发挥了作用。我们还识别出了作为亚群落之间联系纽带的中间人，他们似乎对整个群体的社会凝聚力至关重要。研究发现，该网络在某些方面与人类社交网络相似，但在其他一些方面有所不同，比如群体内按度的同类混合水平。这种差异揭示了该网络形成和演化的一些方式。
