Relationship between network structure and the maximum and minimum levels of homophily

Abstract

When individuals form perceptions about social issues, they tend to be influenced by information from their social connections. Recent studies revealed that homophily is a significant factor contributing to perception biases. Clarifying how the maximum and minimum levels of homophily are influenced by network structure is crucial, yet this issue remains underexplored. This study examined the relationship between the maximum and minimum homophily levels and network structure using several real-world social networks and mathematical models generating small-world and scale-free networks. We found that network structure mainly affects the maximum level of homophily, and the small-world network shows the higher maximum homophily level than random and scale-free networks.