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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Network Dynamics of Social Behavior by University of Pennsylvania

4.6
stars
396 ratings

About the Course

How do revolutions emerge without anyone expecting them? How did social norms about same sex marriage change more rapidly than anyone anticipated? Why do some social innovations take off with relative ease, while others struggle for years without spreading? More generally, what are the forces that control the process of social evolution –from the fashions that we wear, to our beliefs about religious tolerance, to our ideas about the process of scientific discovery and the best ways to manage complex research organizations? The social world is complex and full of surprises. Our experiences and intuitions about the social world as individuals are often quite different from the behaviors that we observe emerging in large societies. Even minor changes to the structure of a social network - changes that are unobservable to individuals within those networks - can lead to radical shifts in the spread of new ideas and behaviors through a population. These “invisible” mathematical properties of social networks have powerful implications for the ways that teams solve problems, the social norms that are likely to emerge, and even the very future of our society. This course condenses the last decade of cutting-edge research on these topics into six modules. Each module provides an in-depth look at a particular research puzzle -with a focus on agent-based models and network theories of social change -and provides an interactive computational model for you try out and to use for making your own explorations! Learning objectives - after this course, students will be able to... - explain how computer models are used to study challenging social problems - describe how networks are used to represent the structure of social relationships - show how individual actions can lead to unintended collective behaviors - provide concrete examples of how social networks can influence social change - discuss how diffusion processes can explain the growth social movements, changes in cultural norms, and the success of team problem solving...

Top reviews

ML

May 9, 2020

Great course for beginners - simple to understand and changes the way you think about communication networks.

BV

Jun 11, 2020

Great content and short/objective videos. One only comment is that, sometimes, the implementation of the models is a bit unclear.

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26 - 50 of 97 Reviews for Network Dynamics of Social Behavior

By Jaco v d W

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Jan 17, 2021

A very enjoyable, useful and well crafted course. Should serve well as an introduction to the field and may be useful to people working any number of industries.

By Samuel M

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Oct 5, 2022

This is an amazing course! It is a very interesting multidisciplinary area that involves the study of human behavior, society and computational modeling.

By Guy M

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Jul 19, 2020

This course is a great place to start if you are looking to have some basic understanding of Network Dynamics of Social Behavior

By Amir E F

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Nov 21, 2017

Although the course was very short and the homework were so easy, I'm quite satisfied by the insight I got from Prof Centola

By Louis K I

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Jun 28, 2019

Fantastic course! Very good introduction to network dynamics for someone who has never explored this field of research.

By Kenny F

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Oct 7, 2022

Really well presented and easy to follow course - super fascinating too! Would love to learn more on this topic.

By Mireille L

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May 10, 2020

Great course for beginners - simple to understand and changes the way you think about communication networks.

By P P

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Jul 18, 2018

excellent course accessible to all. highly recommended.Really looking forward to more courses from this team.

By Jeffrey P

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Apr 12, 2020

A short course (I completed in a single evening) but really interesting with lots of potential applications.

By Karen L

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Aug 21, 2020

loved this class. Helped explain scenarios of collective behavior, drivers, variables. Very interesting.

By Upasana D

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Jun 16, 2022

This is one of the best courses I have taken on Coursera so far. Kudos to professors Damon and Joshua!

By David G V

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Dec 9, 2024

El contenido y la utilidad de este curso fue realmente sorprendente. El nivel es el de un posgrado.

By Martin B L

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Dec 4, 2018

Interesting course! Concepts are very well explained, but it misses practical classes in NetLogo.

By Sebastian P

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Feb 28, 2021

Interesting topics, well lectures, if it would go a little bit more in-depth it would be perfect

By Manyu L

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May 31, 2018

Very down-to-earth. Highly recommended for anyone who wants basic knowledge on network dynamics.

By Venkataraman G

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Dec 9, 2019

This is an excellent introductory course. Highly recommended for students of social sciences.

By Fabian G V

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Apr 5, 2020

Excelent course to start in Network Dynamics. I hope a more advanced course after this one.

By Hugo M d F

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May 31, 2020

An eye-opening course, well structured and with a good balance of knowledge and analysis.

By Aleix D

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Mar 17, 2019

Very interesting topics. I can't wait to apply them to current research.

By Hansel E

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Aug 1, 2020

Insightful course with knowledge that can be applied in various fields.

By Jack O

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Aug 4, 2018

An excellent and inspiring introduction to a new approach to sociology.

By Thuy N

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Oct 6, 2021

Very informative, love the simulation we get to run after each lesson

By Skyler S

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Sep 25, 2019

Very interesting course. Occasionally test questions are too vague.

By Ramkumar S

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Jan 9, 2019

Simple concise videos. Crisp explanations. Cool demos with Netlogo.

By Gustavo C

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Jun 26, 2020

Bring us a new way to see the people's behavior and the world.