Overlapping Community Detection in Dynamic Networks

Abstract

Due to the increasingly large size and changing nature of social networks, algorithms for dynamic networks have become an important part of modern day community detection. In this paper, we use a well-known static community detection algorithm and modify it to discover communities in dynamic networks. We have developed a dynamic community detection algorithm based on Speaker-Listener Label Propagation Algorithm (SLPA) called SLPA Dynamic (SLPAD). This algorithm, tested on two real dynamic networks, cuts down on the time that it would take SLPA to run, as well as produces similar, and in some cases better, communities. We compared SLPAD to SLPA, LabelRankT, and another algorithm we developed, Dynamic Structural Clustering Algorithm for Networks Overlapping (DSCAN-O), to further test its validity and ability to detect overlapping communities when compared to other community detection algorithms. SLPAD proves to be faster than all of these algorithms, as well as produces communities with just as high modularity for each network.