Structural Determinants of Human Resource Development Research Collaboration Networks: A Social-Network Analysis of Publications Between 1990 to 2014

Co-authorship is a product of social capital. Co-authorship is an example of knowledge exchange that expands social capital. During the collaboration, authors exchange their knowledge, resources, and information. Co-authors' repeated relationships generate trust, norms, and networks, thereby creating positive values. To investigate patterns and characteristics of the human resource development (HRD) scholars' collaboration networks, this study applied social network analysis (SNA). The exponential random graph model (ERGM) was used to analyze the influence of structural determinants of co-author collaboration networks that appeared in four major HRD journals from 1990 to 2014. Empirical results confirmed that AHRD co-authorship displays both the small-world phenomenon and a scale-free network whose network-formation processes are influenced by authors' mutual and transitivity-related closure relationships, including multiple 2-paths and edge-wise shared partners. Implications for how author collaborations must be understood and encouraged are also discussed.