Homophily in Voluntary Organizations: Status Distance and the Composition of Face-to-Face Groups

TLDR

Recent research on organized sources of network ties and social structural determinants of association has produced hypotheses about homophily. The study seeks to generate and test hypotheses regarding homophily in voluntary organizations. The authors test these hypotheses using data from 304 face‑to‑face groups in ten communities. Friends are more similar on status dimensions than chance, and homophily arises from both restricted opportunity structures and in‑group choices, while organizational heterogeneity increases dyadic.

Abstract

Recent work on the organized sources of network ties and on the social structural determinants of association are synthesized to produce several hypotheses about homophily. These hypotheses are tested with data on 304 face-to-face groups from 10 communities. We find that friends are more similar on status dimensions than chance and that this homophily is produced both by the restricted opportunity structure offered by the group and by homophilous choices made within the group. Organizational heterogeneity leads to substantially greater dyadic status distance within the organization, while organization size consistently reduces dyadic status distance. At a given level of diversity, a larger group will permit more homophilous friendship pairing. However, correlated status dimensions create little reduction in dyadic social distance. In general, homogeneity within groups is the overwhelming determinant of homophily.