Networks Behind Bars: Insights from the Prison Inmate Network Study

Dr. David Schaefer is a Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of California Irvine. His research is centered on social networks, with emphases on health, adolescence, and delinquent populations. His research program is built upon two related questions:

• How do social networks impact critical developmental and health-related outcomes?
• How do people acquire their respective network positions?

Oftentimes he focuses on adolescent school-based networks though he has recently become interested in networks among prison inmates. Dr. Schaefer uses a variety of analytic methods, most often statistical network models (SIENA and ERGMs), but also simulations and the occasional regression. His work has been generously funded by the National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, and William T. Grant Foundation. He’s most proud of receiving the Freeman Award from the International Network for Social Network Analysis.