LABORATORY FOR THE COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSIS OF EGONETWORKS, SOCIAL COHESION, AND EXCLUSION

The COALESCE Lab is an interdisciplinary research group dedicated to advancing the understanding of social exclusion, cohesion, and polarization through the lens of social network analysis. These phenomena are inherently relational, yet they are frequently examined at the individual level or through social media data, resulting in significant gaps in our knowledge about how they emerge and persist in everyday life. The COALESCE Lab addresses these gaps by focusing on the everyday interactions among citizens and their societal consequences, aiming to bridge the divide between micro-level relationships and macro-level social outcomes.

To achieve this, the lab employs a mixed-methods approach that integrates qualitative research to explore interaction patterns, social boundary formation, their meanings for individuals, and the causal mechanisms behind their formation and dynamics; survey-based and computational network analysis for statistical inference of societal patterns; and agent-based modeling and simulation to investigate potential macro-level dynamics and outcomes in greater depth.

The lab, directed by Prof. Miranda Lubbers, is embedded in the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB). In addition to contributing to personal network theory and empirical applications (e.g., in migration), COALESCE contributes to methodological development in techniques rooted in anthropology, such as cultural consensus analysis, the network scale-up method, and text analysis.

COALESCE is committed to fostering an interdisciplinary research environment, where scholars from diverse backgrounds (anthropology, sociology, political sciences, social work, statistics, computer sciences) collaborate to advance knowledge on pressing societal challenges. It also serves as a training hub for Master's students, PhD candidates, and postdoctoral researchers, providing them with funded opportunities to engage in cutting-edge international research.

The lab’s work is supported by prestigious funding bodies, including the European Research Council (ERC) and the Volkswagen Foundation, among others. We are open to collaboration and also welcome visiting scholars working in relevant research areas, as well as early-career researchers who wish to apply for external funding to join the lab and collaborate with us. 

Learn more