Heng-Chien Liou

Heng-Chien Liou

Researcher

Projects

Network Science

Advisor: Hung-Yun Hsieh

Network science is the study of networks, which are characterized by interconnected entities and their connections. Network is a natural representation for many kinds of phenomena. For example, the relationship among a group of people can be characterized by a social network, the human brain can be described as a network consisting hundreds of billions of neurons, and so on. Network science has been shown as a powerful approach to understand the complex structure and functions of varios kinds of networks.

I am particularly interested in how network science can be applied to the study in psychology. I addressed how the friendship network emerges from dyadic friendship formation and maintenance. Specifically, I wanted to study what kind of role personality plays in this process. More technically, I formulated a network generation model based on the variants of preferential attachment model, introducing heterogeneity into the process of edge formation and maintenance. Then the findings about personality and friendship development were translated into mathematical description. The microscopic processes then amount to the network level characteristics.

Computational Social Science

Advisor: Dr. Hsuan-Wei Lee

Motivated by my experience in networks cience, I want to further study how to use computational methods to answer social science questions. Roughly speaking, computational social science is about using computational methods to approach social science. The methods commonly used in computational social science include agent-based modeling, computer simulation, network analysis, data mining, digital footprint analysis, machine learning,…, and etc.

Algorithmic Fairness

Advisor: Prof. Ho-Lin Chen