This assignment is based on the 2014 VAST Challenge.
You can complete this assignment individually or as a group of up to three members. Please replace “Your Name” in the YAML (top of this script) with the names of all students in your group.
Run the following code chunk to load the packages required for
this assignment and load the email data from the
networkdata package. Check the class of the
emailnet object. Check how many nodes and edges are in this
network. Check what vertex attributes are available for this
network.
library(statnet)
library(devtools)
install_github("ochyzh/networkdata")
library(networkdata)
data(emailnet)Make a visualization of the email network.
In order to help you decide what network processes may have led to this network’s formation, simulate a random network for comparison. Use the same number of nodes and edges in your random network. Visualize the two networks side-by-side. Summarize several network statistics so as to compare the email network to this random network.
Estimate an ergm that is specified based on the above analysis. Simulate 5 networks from your model estimates and compare them to the observed network. How if your model fit?
Use the gof function to check the fit. How does it
look?
Play with your model specification until you achieve a reasonable fit. One the fit is good, interpret the results.
Knit the RMarkdown file (press the “Knit” button above) and read through the corresponding html file.
For the submission: submit your solution in an R Markdown file and (just for insurance) submit the corresponding html file with it.