We study the structure of the social graph of active Facebook users, the
rgest social network ever analyzed. We compute numerous features of the graph
cluding the number of users and friendships, the degree distribution, path
ngths, clustering, and mixing patterns. Our results center around three main
servations. First, we characterize the global structure of the graph,
termining that the social network is nearly fully connected, with 99.91% of
dividuals belonging to a single large connected component, and we confirm the
ix degrees of separation" phenomenon on a global scale. Second, by studying
e average local clustering coefficient and degeneracy of graph neighborhoods,
show that while the Facebook graph as a whole is clearly sparse, the graph
ighborhoods of users contain surprisingly dense structure. Third, we
aracterize the assortativity patterns present in the graph by studying the
sic demographic and network properties of users. We observe clear degree
sortativity and characterize the extent to which "your friends have more
iends than you". Furthermore, we observe a strong effect of age on friendship
eferences as well as a globally modular community structure driven by
tionality, but we do not find any strong gender homophily. We compare our
sults with those from smaller social networks and find mostly, but not
tirely, agreement on common structural network characteristics.

@misc{ugander2011anatomy, author = {Ugander, Johan and Karrer, Brian and Backstrom, Lars and Marlow, Cameron}, title = {The Anatomy of the Facebook Social Graph}, year = {2011}, note = {cite arxiv:1111.4503Comment: 17 pages, 9 figures, 1 table}, url = {http://arxiv.org/abs/1111.4503}, keywords = {graph, facebook, social, network}, abstract = {We study the structure of the social graph of active Facebook users, the
rgest social network ever analyzed. We compute numerous features of the graph
cluding the number of users and friendships, the degree distribution, path
ngths, clustering, and mixing patterns. Our results center around three main
servations. First, we characterize the global structure of the graph,
termining that the social network is nearly fully connected, with 99.91% of
dividuals belonging to a single large connected component, and we confirm the
ix degrees of separation" phenomenon on a global scale. Second, by studying
e average local clustering coefficient and degeneracy of graph neighborhoods,
show that while the Facebook graph as a whole is clearly sparse, the graph
ighborhoods of users contain surprisingly dense structure. Third, we
aracterize the assortativity patterns present in the graph by studying the
sic demographic and network properties of users. We observe clear degree
sortativity and characterize the extent to which "your friends have more
iends than you". Furthermore, we observe a strong effect of age on friendship
eferences as well as a globally modular community structure driven by
tionality, but we do not find any strong gender homophily. We compare our
sults with those from smaller social networks and find mostly, but not
tirely, agreement on common structural network characteristics.} }

%0 = misc %A = Ugander, Johan and Karrer, Brian and Backstrom, Lars and Marlow, Cameron %D = 2011 %T = The Anatomy of the Facebook Social Graph %U = http://arxiv.org/abs/1111.4503