Jacques-Antoine Gauthier

How much does it cost? Optimization of costs in sequence analysis of social science data

One major methodological problem in analysis of sequence data is the determination of costs from which distances between sequences are derived. Although this problem is currently not optimally dealt with in the social sciences, it has some similarity with problems that have been solved in bioinformatics for three decades. In this article, the authors propose an optimization of substitution and deletion/insertion costs based on computational methods. The authors provide an empirical way of determining costs for cases, frequent in the social sciences, in which theory does not clearly promote one cost scheme over another. Using three distinct data sets, the authors tested the distances and cluster solutions produced by the new cost scheme in comparison with solutions based on cost schemes associated with other research strategies. The proposed method performs well compared with other cost-setting strategies, while it alleviates the justification problem of cost schemes.

Multichannel Sequence Analysis Applied to Social Science Data

Applications of optimal matching analysis in the social sciences are typically based on sequences of specific social statuses that model the residential, family, or occupational trajectories of individuals. Despite the broadly recognized interdependence of these statuses, few attempts have been made to systematize the ways in which optimal matching analysis should be applied multidimensionally—that is, in an approach that takes into account multiple trajectories simultaneously. Based on methods pioneered in the field of bioinformatics, this paper proposes a method of multichannel sequence analysis (MCSA) that simultaneously extends the usual optimal matching analysis (OMA) to multiple life spheres. Using data from the Swiss household panel (SHP), we examine the types of trajectories obtained using MCSA. We also consider a random data set and find that MCSA offers an alternative to the sole use of ex-post sum of distance matrices by locally aligning distinct life trajectories simultaneously. Moreover, MCSA reduces the complexity of the typologies it allows to produce, without making them less informative. It is more robust to noise in the data, and it provides more reliable alignments than two independent OMA.

Optimizing the Marriage Market Through the Reallocation of Partners: An Application of the Linear Assignment Model

Research shows that success of marriages and other intimate partnerships depend on objective attributes such as differences of age, cultural background or educational levels between partners. This article proposes a mathematical approach of marriage which intends to optimally allocate spouses in order to reduce the likelihood of divorce within the set of structural constraints defining a marriage market. Based on a representative and longitudinal sample of 1074 cohabitating and married couples living in Switzerland, we estimate various objective functions corresponding to age, education, ethnicity and previous divorce experience concerning every possible combination of men and women. Our results show that the current state of marriages or partnerships is well below the social optimum. About 7 individuals over 10 (68%) are reallocated to a couple with a higher chance of survival than the actual couple that they belong to. This reallocation leads the initial non optimal situations to the final optimal situations with a reduction of the objective function by 21% of its initial value.

How Central and Connected Am I in my Family? Bridging and Bonding Social Capital in Family Configurations of Young Adults With Psychiatric Disorders

Aims: This article explores the structures of relational resources that individuals with psychiatric disorders get from their family configurations using the concept of social capital. Methods: The research is based on a sample of 54 individuals with psychiatric disorders and behavioural problems, and a comparison sample of 54 individuals without a clinical record matched to the clinical respondents for age and sex. Standard measures of social capital from social network methods are applied on family configurations of individuals from both samples. Differences are tested by variance analysis. Results: Structures of family resources available to individuals with psychiatric disorders are distinct. Individuals with psychiatric disorders perceive themselves as less central in their family configurations and less connected to their family members. Their significant family members are perceived as less connected with each other. As a whole, their family configurations are smaller and do not include spouses or partners. Therefore bridging and bonding social capitals are not readily available for them. Conclusion: As family configurations of individuals with psychiatric disorders provide fewer relational resources than other families, they are not able to deal with social integration of individuals with psychiatric disorders on their own.

Pluralized life courses? An exploration of the life trajectories of individuals with psychiatric disorders

Background: Most of the existing research relating to the life courses of people with psychiatric symptoms focuses on the occurrence and the impact of non-normative events on the onsets of crises; it usually disregards the more regular dimensions of life, such as work, family and intimate partnerships that may be related to the timing and seriousness of psychiatric problems. An additional reason for empirically addressing life trajectories of individuals with psychiatric problems relates to recent changes of family and occupational trajectories in relation to societal trends such as individualization and pluralization of life courses. Aim: This paper explores the life trajectories of 86 individuals under clinical supervision and proposes a typology of their occupational, co-residence and intimacy trajectories. The results are discussed in light of the life-course paradigm. Method: A multidimensional optimal matching analysis was performed on a sample of 86 individuals under clinical supervision to create a typology of trajectories. The influence of these trajectories on psychiatric disorders, evaluated using a SCL-90-R questionnaire, was then assessed using linear regression modelling. Results: The typologies of trajectories showed that the patients developed a diversity of life trajectories. Individuals who have developed a standard life course with few institutionalization periods reported more symptoms and distress than individuals with an institutionalized life trajectory. Conclusion: The results of this study stress that psychiatric patients are social actors who are influenced by society at large and its ongoing process of change. Therefore, it is essential to take into account the diversity of occupational and family trajectories when dealing with individuals in therapeutic settings.

Introduction: Sequence Analysis in 2014

Since its introduction in the social sciences in the 1980s, sequence analysis (SA) has enhanced our understanding of a broad range of social processes. In this chapter we recall fundamental underlying sociological concepts, such as narratives, trajectories, stages, events, transitions and the role of the context. We also differentiate levels of sequential complexity that have consequences on the way SA is applied. Following this, we sketch out the intellectual, technical and sociological factors that made SA converge around a core program defined by specific fieldwork, data, time frames and statistical tools. The core program has ensured a set of common standards, while at the same time leaving room for variants and alternatives. The book discusses both these standards and identifies a set of new challenges. Among these, sequence comparison implies rethinking about the notion of sequence, its sociological underpinnings, its mathematical robustness and the value of competing algorithms. Life course sequences continue innovating, for example on multiple life domains, linked lives, the subjective dimension of trajectories and the role of age. Beyond sociology, SA sheds new light on political issues at the levels of individuals, groups and institutions. Improvements also take place regarding sequence visualisation, from network graphs to event-based synchronisation and optimisation of graphical representation that are both rich in information and intuitive to capture.

Using Life History Calendars to Survey Vulnerability

This chapter discusses the rationale for the use of life history calendars in studying social and psychological vulnerability. Pragmatic and substantive aspects suggest that life history calendars are powerful tools for retrospective surveys on vulnerability. Life history calendars are substantially more cost-effective and easier to implement than prospective longitudinal designs while being in line with the life course paradigm. They can be used as follows: to investigate how people react to negative life events and which resources come into play to overcome conditions of vulnerability; to understand processes of accumulation of (dis)advantages in relation to the concept of vulnerability; and to observe how such processes are constructed across the life course and across life domains. In addition life history calendars address the interconnection between the factual events and their subjective perception by participants. Thus data produced by life history calendars are suitable to different paradigms that apply life histories as a socio-cognitive process. This chapter presents four tools developed at the University of Lausanne and the University of Geneva with a special focus on the operationalisation of different aspects of vulnerability such as the study of accumulation and diffusion effects of (dis)advantages across life domains.

The Impact of Coresidence Trajectories on Personal Networks During Transition to Adulthood: A Comparative Perspective

Over the life course, individuals develop personal networks that provide essential resources, sporadically or on a daily basis, such as instrumental, emotional, and informational support. Those personal networks are composed of family (i.e., primary and extended kin) and nonfamily ties (i.e., friends, colleagues, acquaintances) (Pahl and Spencer 2004). The prominence of specific ties varies across the life course depending on life stages, transitions, and events. Following the linked-lives principles (Elder et al. 2003), these transitions trigger changes in household composition, promoting different types of relational interdependencies. The level of interdependence with some household members may have a cumulative effect by strengthening the bonds, whereas with others the effect may be more ephemeral and lead to the exclusion of such ties in current personal networks. Thus, coresidence trajectories, such as the experience of growing up in a two or one-parent family, leaving the parental home early or late, moving in with a partner or living alone, becoming a parent, divorcing, and other events, will differentially influence the composition of personal networks.

The Destruction of Multiethnic Locations: Markers of Identity and the Determinants of Residential Trajectories

This chapter introduces a second dimension of ethnicisation: the interdependency between markers of identity and migration behaviour and how it has resulted in new (ethnic) communities of fate and the dismantling of many multi-ethnic locations. The authors hypothesise that specific structures of constraints and opportunities emerge at both the macro- and micro-sociological levels and that individual as well as collective characteristics exert a specific influence on candidates for moving and on the choice of destination. They also ask which populations’ members are more likely to change residence in specific contexts of collective violence and threat. In most areas of the former Yugoslavia, religious affiliation was an important marker of ethnic identity. The authors compare its impact with that of actual religious practice and wonder how it may combine with markers of other social affiliations—sex, level of education or birth cohort—to influence the timing, duration and destination of residential mobility, given the demographic composition and the occurrence of violent conflict in the considered areas. They also ask to what extent migrations from one region of former Yugoslavia to another followed complementary or symmetrical dynamics (e.g. resulting from ethnic cleansing). Are there alternative patterns, as for instance international migration, associated with specific sub-populations? To deal with these issues, they report analyses of residential trajectories on the basis of the life calendars of TRACES in three targeted areas: Slavonia and Dalmatia in Croatia; Bosnia-Herzegovina; and Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo. Complementary analyses of the socio-demographic characteristics of movers show that religious affiliation was an important factor of migration, whereas religious practice had almost no effect. This suggests that the pressure to emigrate temporarily or definitely was based on external identity labelling processes, rather than intrinsic individual motivations. Individuals belonging to the cohort 1957–1973 (those being between 18 and 35 years old at the beginning of the war) were also more likely to migrate than the others.

Trajectories of intimate partnerships, sexual attitudes, desire and satisfaction

This research addresses the interrelations existing between trajectories of intimate partnerships and attitudes toward sexuality, sexual desire, and sexual satisfaction. It is based on a dataset of 600 adults aged 25-46 living in Geneva (Switzerland) and uses innovative multivariate techniques for clustering life trajectories. The results emphasize the diversity of mens and womens trajectories of intimate partnerships. Trajectories with frequent and short-term partnerships are associated with recreational attitudes and higher solitary and dyadic sexual desire. In contrast, trajectories featuring few or no intimate partnerships are associated with traditional sexual attitudes and less sexual desire. Womens attitudes toward sexuality are more strongly associated with their intimate trajectories than mens. This suggests that men and women do not develop their sexuality in the same relation with intimacy. The results are referred to the gendered master status hypothesis.