Sean Everton
Biographic Data
| ID | 947616 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Sean Everton |
| GIVEN NAMES | Sean |
| FAMILY NAME | Everton |
| SIGNATURE | EVERTON S |
| AFFILIATIONS | Naval Postgraduate School |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2733-9149 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 18 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 49 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 18 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2000 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
Leveraging latent space network models for community intervention
American Civil Religion in the Era of Trump
In 1967, Robert Bellah argued that America's "founding myth", what he called American civil religion, helps bind American society together by providing its citizens with a sense of origin, direction, and meaning. For evidence, Bellah primarily turned to the inaugural speeches of American presidents. This paper draws on semantic network analysis to empirically examine the inaugural addresses of Presidents Trump and Biden, looking for evidence of w…
Strong ties and where to find them
Historical and Comparative Research on Social Diffusion
Historical and comparative social scientists are increasingly interested in explaining the spread of innovations—which social scientists commonly refer to as diffusion and, broadly conceived, can include the spread of new ideas, behaviors, technologies, and institutions. However, in spite of the profusion of studies, researchers do not always specify a diffusion model or its underlying causal mechanisms. Whereas many studies document spatial diff…
The Quest for the Gist of Jesus
Studies have found that while experts can be quite good at identifying criteria related to a particular phenomenon, they are typically outperformed by improper linear models ( ilm ), which assign equal weights to criteria. In this article, using widely-accepted criteria for assessing the authenticity of the sayings of Jesus, we generate a new ranking of Jesus’ sayings using an ilm . Then, drawing on recent advances in text mining—semantic network…
Plagues, Pagans, and Christians
In his book, The Rise of Christianity, Rodney Stark argues that the early Christian church indirectly benefitted from the plagues that struck the early Roman Empire in the 2nd and 3rd centuries of the Common Era. In particular, he argues that the early church's doctrines concerning love, charity, and social service would have led Christians to enjoy higher survival rates than pagans, which would have left the social networks of the former relativ…
Networks and Religion
Social scientists who study religion generally believe that social networks play a central role in religious life. However, most studies draw on measures that are relatively poor proxies for capturing the effects of social networks. This book illustrates how researchers can draw on formal social network analysis methods to explore the interplay of networks and religion. The book's introductory chapters provide overviews of the social scientific s…
Hiding in plain sight
Social Networks and Religious Violence
The causes of religious violence have attracted numerous explanations in the years since the 9/11 attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Towers. However, most forms of religious extremism do not result in violence (e.g., the Amish, Hasidim, Jains) and religious groups have not cornered the market on egregious violence. Nevertheless, religious violence does occur, and this paper examines the interplay of social networks and religious violence…
What Are The Odds
In 1985 a group of New Testament scholars, who came to be known as the Jesus Seminar, gathered to vote on the authenticity of the sayings of Jesus. Although the Seminar argued that it followed objective rules of evidence, critics have claimed that it did not. This paper investigates these claims using statistical models to evaluate the Seminar’s own voting records. It finds that although the Seminar’s Fellows did follow widely accepted criteria, …
Brokers and Key Players in the Internationalization of the Farc
The Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia—FARC) was originally founded to protect Colombian peasants from harsh landowner policies in exchange for food and supplies. Over time, it has evolved into an internationally connected, narco-trafficking organization that displays little concern for the peasants it once vowed to protect. In recent years, Colombian authorities have become more adept at counterin…
Disrupting Dark Networks
Disrupting Dark Networks focuses on how social network analysis can be used to craft strategies to track, destabilize and disrupt covert and illegal networks. The book begins with an overview of the key terms and assumptions of social network analysis and various counterinsurgency strategies. The next several chapters introduce readers to algorithms and metrics commonly used by social network analysts. They provide worked examples from four diffe…
Detecting significant changes in dark networks
To date, most social network analyses (SNAs) of terrorist groups have used network data that provide snap-shots of the groups at a single point in time. Seldom have they used network data that take into account how the groups have changed over time. In this article, a unique longitudinal network data set, the Noordin Top terrorist network from 2001 to 2010, is examined in order to explore whether a recently developed method – social network chang…
Strategies for Combating Dark Networks
Our goal in this paper is to explore two generic approaches to disrupting dark networks: kinetic and non-kinetic. The kinetic approach involves aggressive and offensive measures to eliminate or capture network members and their supporters, while the non-kinetic approach involves the use of subtle, non-coercive means for combating dark networks. Two strategies derive from the kinetic approach: Targeting and Capacity-building. Four strategies deriv…
Global Development and Human (In)security
Over the past 30 years rapid advances in the realm of digital technology and the establishment of an ever expanding globally networked communications infrastructure have radically altered the infrastructure of the global economy. Combined with new rules for international finance, the de-regulation of capital and labour markets and the embracing of a ‘free trade’ ethos by most states in the international system, today's ‘information age’ bears lit…
Never on Sunny Days
Congregational attendance data are abundant, accessible, and relevant for religious research. Weekly attendance histories provide information about worshippers, congregations, and denominations that surveys cannot capture. The histories yield novel measures of commitment, testable implications of rational choice theory, and compelling evidence that attendance responds strongly to changes in the opportunity cost of time
The Promise Keepers
While research on the Promise Keepers movement has yielded some highly suggestive findings, it has failed to draw comparisons between it and other groups or movements. In this article I contribute a small piece to this comparative puzzle by using content analysis to compare the elite gender ideologies of Promise Keeper and mainstream evangelical commentators (as represented by the magazine Christianity Today). While both Promise Keepers and Chris…
The Promise Keepers
Strategies for Combating Dark Networks
Our goal in this paper is to explore two generic approaches to disrupting dark networks: kinetic and non-kinetic. The kinetic approach involves aggressive and offensive measures to eliminate or capture network members and their supporters, while the non-kinetic approach involves the use of subtle, non-coercive means for combating dark networks. Two strategies derive from the kinetic approach: Targeting and Capacity-building. Four strategies deriv…
Never on Sunny Days
Congregational attendance data are abundant, accessible, and relevant for religious research. Weekly attendance histories provide information about worshippers, congregations, and denominations that surveys cannot capture. The histories yield novel measures of commitment, testable implications of rational choice theory, and compelling evidence that attendance responds strongly to changes in the opportunity cost of time
Social Networks and Religious Violence
The causes of religious violence have attracted numerous explanations in the years since the 9/11 attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Towers. However, most forms of religious extremism do not result in violence (e.g., the Amish, Hasidim, Jains) and religious groups have not cornered the market on egregious violence. Nevertheless, religious violence does occur, and this paper examines the interplay of social networks and religious violence…
The Promise Keepers
While research on the Promise Keepers movement has yielded some highly suggestive findings, it has failed to draw comparisons between it and other groups or movements. In this article I contribute a small piece to this comparative puzzle by using content analysis to compare the elite gender ideologies of Promise Keeper and mainstream evangelical commentators (as represented by the magazine Christianity Today). While both Promise Keepers and Chris…
Brokers and Key Players in the Internationalization of the Farc
The Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia—FARC) was originally founded to protect Colombian peasants from harsh landowner policies in exchange for food and supplies. Over time, it has evolved into an internationally connected, narco-trafficking organization that displays little concern for the peasants it once vowed to protect. In recent years, Colombian authorities have become more adept at counterin…
Detecting significant changes in dark networks
To date, most social network analyses (SNAs) of terrorist groups have used network data that provide snap-shots of the groups at a single point in time. Seldom have they used network data that take into account how the groups have changed over time. In this article, a unique longitudinal network data set, the Noordin Top terrorist network from 2001 to 2010, is examined in order to explore whether a recently developed method – social network chang…
Historical and Comparative Research on Social Diffusion
Historical and comparative social scientists are increasingly interested in explaining the spread of innovations—which social scientists commonly refer to as diffusion and, broadly conceived, can include the spread of new ideas, behaviors, technologies, and institutions. However, in spite of the profusion of studies, researchers do not always specify a diffusion model or its underlying causal mechanisms. Whereas many studies document spatial diff…
Plagues, Pagans, and Christians
In his book, The Rise of Christianity, Rodney Stark argues that the early Christian church indirectly benefitted from the plagues that struck the early Roman Empire in the 2nd and 3rd centuries of the Common Era. In particular, he argues that the early church's doctrines concerning love, charity, and social service would have led Christians to enjoy higher survival rates than pagans, which would have left the social networks of the former relativ…
The Promise Keepers
The Promise Keepers
While research on the Promise Keepers movement has yielded some highly suggestive findings, it has failed to draw comparisons between it and other groups or movements. In this article I contribute a small piece to this comparative puzzle by using content analysis to compare the elite gender ideologies of Promise Keeper and mainstream evangelical commentators (as represented by the magazine Christianity Today). While both Promise Keepers and Chris…
Never on Sunny Days
Congregational attendance data are abundant, accessible, and relevant for religious research. Weekly attendance histories provide information about worshippers, congregations, and denominations that surveys cannot capture. The histories yield novel measures of commitment, testable implications of rational choice theory, and compelling evidence that attendance responds strongly to changes in the opportunity cost of time
Global Development and Human (In)security
Over the past 30 years rapid advances in the realm of digital technology and the establishment of an ever expanding globally networked communications infrastructure have radically altered the infrastructure of the global economy. Combined with new rules for international finance, the de-regulation of capital and labour markets and the embracing of a ‘free trade’ ethos by most states in the international system, today's ‘information age’ bears lit…
Strategies for Combating Dark Networks
Our goal in this paper is to explore two generic approaches to disrupting dark networks: kinetic and non-kinetic. The kinetic approach involves aggressive and offensive measures to eliminate or capture network members and their supporters, while the non-kinetic approach involves the use of subtle, non-coercive means for combating dark networks. Two strategies derive from the kinetic approach: Targeting and Capacity-building. Four strategies deriv…
Disrupting Dark Networks
Disrupting Dark Networks focuses on how social network analysis can be used to craft strategies to track, destabilize and disrupt covert and illegal networks. The book begins with an overview of the key terms and assumptions of social network analysis and various counterinsurgency strategies. The next several chapters introduce readers to algorithms and metrics commonly used by social network analysts. They provide worked examples from four diffe…
Detecting significant changes in dark networks
To date, most social network analyses (SNAs) of terrorist groups have used network data that provide snap-shots of the groups at a single point in time. Seldom have they used network data that take into account how the groups have changed over time. In this article, a unique longitudinal network data set, the Noordin Top terrorist network from 2001 to 2010, is examined in order to explore whether a recently developed method – social network chang…
Brokers and Key Players in the Internationalization of the Farc
The Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia—FARC) was originally founded to protect Colombian peasants from harsh landowner policies in exchange for food and supplies. Over time, it has evolved into an internationally connected, narco-trafficking organization that displays little concern for the peasants it once vowed to protect. In recent years, Colombian authorities have become more adept at counterin…
What Are The Odds
In 1985 a group of New Testament scholars, who came to be known as the Jesus Seminar, gathered to vote on the authenticity of the sayings of Jesus. Although the Seminar argued that it followed objective rules of evidence, critics have claimed that it did not. This paper investigates these claims using statistical models to evaluate the Seminar’s own voting records. It finds that although the Seminar’s Fellows did follow widely accepted criteria, …
Social Networks and Religious Violence
The causes of religious violence have attracted numerous explanations in the years since the 9/11 attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Towers. However, most forms of religious extremism do not result in violence (e.g., the Amish, Hasidim, Jains) and religious groups have not cornered the market on egregious violence. Nevertheless, religious violence does occur, and this paper examines the interplay of social networks and religious violence…
Networks and Religion
Social scientists who study religion generally believe that social networks play a central role in religious life. However, most studies draw on measures that are relatively poor proxies for capturing the effects of social networks. This book illustrates how researchers can draw on formal social network analysis methods to explore the interplay of networks and religion. The book's introductory chapters provide overviews of the social scientific s…
Hiding in plain sight
Plagues, Pagans, and Christians
In his book, The Rise of Christianity, Rodney Stark argues that the early Christian church indirectly benefitted from the plagues that struck the early Roman Empire in the 2nd and 3rd centuries of the Common Era. In particular, he argues that the early church's doctrines concerning love, charity, and social service would have led Christians to enjoy higher survival rates than pagans, which would have left the social networks of the former relativ…
The Quest for the Gist of Jesus
Studies have found that while experts can be quite good at identifying criteria related to a particular phenomenon, they are typically outperformed by improper linear models ( ilm ), which assign equal weights to criteria. In this article, using widely-accepted criteria for assessing the authenticity of the sayings of Jesus, we generate a new ranking of Jesus’ sayings using an ilm . Then, drawing on recent advances in text mining—semantic network…
Strong ties and where to find them
Historical and Comparative Research on Social Diffusion
Historical and comparative social scientists are increasingly interested in explaining the spread of innovations—which social scientists commonly refer to as diffusion and, broadly conceived, can include the spread of new ideas, behaviors, technologies, and institutions. However, in spite of the profusion of studies, researchers do not always specify a diffusion model or its underlying causal mechanisms. Whereas many studies document spatial diff…
American Civil Religion in the Era of Trump
In 1967, Robert Bellah argued that America's "founding myth", what he called American civil religion, helps bind American society together by providing its citizens with a sense of origin, direction, and meaning. For evidence, Bellah primarily turned to the inaugural speeches of American presidents. This paper draws on semantic network analysis to empirically examine the inaugural addresses of Presidents Trump and Biden, looking for evidence of w…
Leveraging latent space network models for community intervention
Sociology (11 works) · Computer Science (8 works) · Religion and Society Interactions (8 works) · Philosophy (7 works) · Political science (7 works) · History (5 works) · Law (5 works) · Politics (5 works) · Social network analysis (5 works) · World Wide Web (5 works)