Arnout van de Rijt

Arnout van de Rijt is Professor of Sociology at Utrecht University. He received his Ph.D. in Sociology from Cornell University in 2007 and worked until 2016 as Assistant and Associate Professor of Sociology at Stony Brook University in the USA, where he co-led the Center for Computational Social Science.

His research interests include social network analysis and computational social science. His work on cumulative advantage investigates how small, random differences in early success between people can with time, through positive feedback, grow into large gaps between the successful and unsuccessful; and how a person or thing can remain highly popular when a less popular alternative is of higher quality. Van de Rijt’s work on social networks shows how large, complex network structures emerge as the by-product of many individuals’ decisions on whom to interact with and whom to avoid.

For his work van de Rijt received the Lynton Freeman (2010) and Raymond Boudon (2017) early career awards. His work has been funded by the National Science Foundation. His papers have been published in such journals as PNAS, American Sociological Review, and the American Journal of Sociology. Coverage of his work have appeared in various media, among which Nature and the Economist.

Updates

May 2019

It was just announced our article “The Matthew Effect in Science Funding” (with Thijs Bol and Mathijs de Vaan, PNAS, 2018) was awarded the Coleman Outstanding Article Award!

April 2019

My article “Self-Reinforcing Dynamics in Social Influence Processes” which came out in American Journal of Sociology this month show that if a bad thing is temporarily more popular than a good thing, in the long run the good thing will tend to regain its natural dominance in popularity.

April 2018

Our paper on the Matthew effect in science funding is now out in PNAS! We find that luck with early-career funding has a big ripple effect on subsequent academic success. It’s also discussed in Nature, Volkskrant and Trouw

March 2018

The data and code from our study “Arbitrary Inequality in Reputation Systems” are now available at the Open Science Framework.

February 2018

The data and code from our paper “Field Experiments of Success-Breeds-Success Dynamics” are now available at the Open Science Framework.

December 2017

I’m very happy to have received the Raymond Boudon award from the European Academy of Sociology!

Selected publications

Arnout van de Rijt. 2019. “Self-Correcting Dynamics in Social Influence Processes.” American Journal of Sociology 124(5):1468-95.

Thijs Bol, Mathijs de Vaan and Arnout van de Rijt. 2018. “The Matthew Effect in Science Funding.” PNAS. pdf data&code Press: Nature, Volkskrant, Trouw

Vincenz Frey and Arnout van de Rijt. 2016. “Arbitrary Inequality in Reputation Systems.” Scientific Reports 6: 38304. pdf data & code

Eran Shor, Arnout van de Rijt, Alex Miltsov, Vivek Kulkarni and Steven Skiena. 2015. “A Paper Ceiling: Explaining the Persistent Underrepresentation of Female Names in Printed News Coverage.” American Sociological Review 80(5): 960-84. pdf Press: The Guardian, Yahoo, NPR Wisconsin, Pacific Standard, RAI, CIBL-FM, Financial Express, Business Standard, Daily Beast

Damon Centola and Arnout van de Rijt. 2015. “Choosing Your Network: Social Preferences in an Online Health Community.” Social Science & Medicine 125: 19-31. pdf

Arnout van de Rijt, Soong Moon Kang, Michael Restivo and Akshay Patil. 2014. “Field Experiments of Success-Breeds-Success Dynamics.” PNAS 111(19):6934–39. pdf data&code Press: Economist, Time, National Geographic, WAMC, Daily News, Daily Mail, World News, Business Insider, Phys.org, FT Alphaville, Psychology Today.

Arnout van de Rijt, Eran Shor, Charles Ward and Steven Skiena. 2013. “Only Fifteen Minutes? The Social Stratification of Fame in Printed Media.” American Sociological Review 78(2): 266-89. pdf data&code Press: LA Times, NBC News, Toronto Star, Globe and Mail, Yahoo News, Pacific Standard, Politiken (front page), U.S. News and World Report, Philly, LiveScience.com, Smithsonian, Hindustan Times, UPI, Winnipeg Free Press, PsychCentral, Salon, Jezebel

Michael Restivo and Arnout van de Rijt. 2012. “Experimental Study of Informal Rewards in Peer Production.” PLoS ONE 7(3): e34358. pdf

Arnout van de Rijt, David Siegel, and Michael Macy. 2009. “Neighborhood Chance and Neighborhood Change: Comment on Bruch and Mare.” American Journal of Sociology 114(4):1166-80. code

Vincent Buskens and Arnout van de Rijt. 2008. “Dynamics of Networks if Everyone Strives for Structural Holes.” American Journal of Sociology 114(2):371-407. pdf