Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, Department of Sociomedical Sciences, 722 West 168th Street, New York, NY, 10032, USA.
Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, Department of Epidemiology, 722 West 168th Street, New York, NY, 10032, USA.
Soc Sci Med. 2019 Jan;220:81-101. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2018.10.013. Epub 2018 Oct 19.
Interest in conceptualizing, measuring, and applying social network analysis (SNA) in public health has grown tremendously in recent years. While these studies have broadened our understanding of the role that social networks play in health, there has been less research that has investigated the application of SNA to inform health-related interventions. This systematic review aimed to capture the current applied use of SNA in the development, dissemination, implementation, and sustainability of health behavior interventions for adults. We identified 52 articles published between 2004 and 2016. A wide variety of study settings were identified, most commonly in the US context and most often related to sexual health and HIV prevention. We found that 38% of articles explicitly applied SNA to inform some aspect of interventions. Use of SNA to inform intervention development (as opposed to dissemination, implementation, or sustainability) was most common. The majority of articles represented in this review (n = 39) were quantitative studies, and 13 articles included a qualitative component. Partial networks were most represented across articles, and over 100 different networks measures were assessed. The most commonly described measures were network density, size, and degree centrality. Finally, very few articles defined SNA and not all articles using SNA were theoretically-informed. Given the nascent and heterogeneous state of the literature in this area, this is an important time for the field to coalesce on terminology, measures, and theoretical frameworks. We highlight areas for researchers to advance work on the application of SNA in the design, dissemination, implementation and sustainability of behavioral interventions.
近年来，人们对将社会网络分析（SNA）概念化、测量和应用于公共卫生领域的兴趣大增。虽然这些研究拓宽了我们对社会网络在健康中所起作用的理解，但对于应用 SNA 来为健康相关干预措施提供信息的研究却较少。本系统评价旨在捕捉当前 SNA 在成人健康行为干预措施的制定、传播、实施和可持续性方面的应用情况。我们确定了 2004 年至 2016 年间发表的 52 篇文章。确定了各种各样的研究环境，最常见的是在美国背景下，最常与性健康和 HIV 预防有关。我们发现，38%的文章明确应用 SNA 来告知干预措施的某些方面。最常见的是应用 SNA 来告知干预措施的制定（而不是传播、实施或可持续性）。本综述中代表的大多数文章（n=39）都是定量研究，有 13 篇文章包含定性部分。在这些文章中，部分网络最为常见，评估了超过 100 种不同的网络测量方法。最常描述的指标是网络密度、大小和中心度。最后，很少有文章定义了 SNA，并且并非所有使用 SNA 的文章都是基于理论的。鉴于该领域文献的新兴和异质性，现在是该领域就术语、测量方法和理论框架达成一致的重要时刻。我们强调了研究人员在 SNA 在行为干预措施的设计、传播、实施和可持续性方面的应用方面推进工作的领域。
