The ANSNA
Garry Robins
Early Career Research Award

The ANSNA Garry Robins Early Career Research Award, launched in 2023, recognises significant achievement of an early or mid career researcher in Australian social network research. It will be awarded annually to an early/mid career scholar from an Australian research institution to acknowledge contributions to (1) the scientific study of social networks and (2) to the Australian social network research community.

The award will be given to a scholar who is in the earlier stages of their career (i.e. someone who has received their PhD within the past 15 years, accounting for any career interruptions, e.g. family, health, etc.).

Garry Robins’ contributions to social network analysis in Australia have been profound, not least through the supervision and mentoring of a generation of scholars in the field. His theoretical and methodological innovations are recognised for their significance internationally, and in 2016 he was awarded the Simmel Award.

The first ANSNA Early Career Research Award winner, Assoc. Prof Peng Wang, was announced at ANSNA’s Australian Social Network Analysis Conference (ASNAC) in Sydney in 2023. The award recipient will give an opening lecture at the following ASNAC in 2024; this lecture will review the work for which the award was given. Expenses for conference registration in 2024 will be part of the award.

Download a Garry Robins Award nomination form

2023 Inaugural Winner

Peng Wang

Peng is Associate Professor of Innovation Studies at Swinburne University of Technology. His research focuses on the methodology development for statistical models for social networks, including Exponential Random Graph Models (ERGM) for social selection processes, and Auto-logistic Actor Attribute Models (ALAAM) for social influence processes. Peng is the designer and programmer for the PNet suite of software package for the statistical modelling of one-mode, two-mode, multiplex, multilevel networks, as well as the co-evolution of network structure and individual outcomes. Peng has applied these models in the research fields of public health, education, management, social-ecological systems, interlocking directorates, public policy, and social network intervention evaluations.