We examine the informal exchange of favors in societies such that any two individuals interact too infrequently to sustain exchange, but such that the social pressure of the possible loss of multiple relationships can sustain exchange. Patterns of exchange that are locally enforceable and...

Abstract: This essay makes a conceptual distinction between societal categories, such as social networks, norms, and social status differentiation, on the one hand, and social capital, on the other. The former are institutional phenomena arising as outcomes of social-exchange games in which...

We investigate the role of manipulation in a model of opinion formation. Agents repeatedly communicate with their neighbors in the social network, can exert effort to manipulate the trust of others, and update their opinions about some common issue by taking weighted averages of neighbors'...

Can online social contacts replace the importance of real-life social connections in our pursuit of happiness? With the growing use of social network sites (SNSs), attention has been increasingly drawn to this topic. Our study empirically examines the effect of SNS use on happiness for different...

The contribution of this paper to the social capital literature is twofold. Drawing on the Italian data, it firstly provides a new framework for measurement, allowing to build indicators for five different components of the multidimensional concept of social capital. Secondly, it provides a...

We use a unique dataset to study how participation in two specific types of nonprofit organizations, i.e. social welfare associations and social cooperatives, affects individual social capital. A descriptive analysis shows that both the types of organization have a positive impact. The...

Recent Eurobarometer survey data are used to document and explain the stock of social capital in 27 European countries. Social capital in Central and Eastern Europe - measured by civic participation and access to social networks - lags behind that in Western European countries. Using regression...

We study whether interactions between individuals with different skills, expertise and perspectives influenced innovation in U.S. counties from 1850 to 1940. We introduce and validate a new measure of social interactional diversity based on the distribution of surnames: lower surname diversity...

This paper analyzes the structural dimension of social capital, and its impact on the success of open source software projects. By examining ties existing between open source projects through their core members altogether with other contributors, we identify the communication paths and flows of...