Social Networks in Accounting Research

Abstract

This study explores collaborative research that is published in four accounting journals: the Accounting Review, the Journal of Accounting Research, the Journal of Accounting and Economics and Accounting, Organizations and Society. We employ social network analysis in order to discover the relational structure of co-authorship in accounting research. We find that that the network of authoring accounting academics has become increasingly integrated over time. The co-authorship network exhibits "small-world" properties: a giant component that covers the biggest part of the network of collaborating authors and collaborating institutions, small average distance within the giant component and a high clustering coefficient.