Egocentric Analysis of Dynamic Networks with EgoLines

AbstractThe egocentric analysis of dynamic networks focuses ondiscovering the temporal patterns of a subnetwork around aspecific central actor (i.e., an ego-network). These types ofanalyses are useful in many application domains, such associal science and business intelligence, providing insightsabout how the central actor interacts with the outside world.We present EgoLines, an interactive visualization to supportthe egocentric analysis of dynamic networks. Usinga “subway map” metaphor, a user can trace an individualactor over the evolution of the ego-network. The design ofEgoLines is grounded in a set of key analytical questionspertinent to egocentric analysis, derived from our interviewswith three domain experts and general network analysis tasks.We demonstrate the effectiveness of EgoLines in egocentricanalysis tasks through a controlled experiment with 18 participantsand a use-case developed with a domain expert.