Networks from culture: Mechanisms of tie-formation follow institutionalized rules in social fields

Tie-formation mechanisms like homophily, reciprocity, transitivity, and preferential attachment operate to varying degrees across contexts. Romantic ties tend to be homophilous by age, education, and ethnicity, and to remain dyadic. Scientific citations, in contrast, fall into highly unequal preferential attachment patterns. Triangulation is nearly absent in advice and patronage networks but features prominently in friendship ties. Building on relational sociology and field theory, we argue that such variation in patterns of connectivity derives from the meaning attached to relationships, which varies by context. Tie-formation logics are institutionalized rules-of-the-game and susceptible to change over time. Accordingly, the mechanisms of tie-formation behind empirical network patterns have to be connected to the cultural rules in particular fields.