Deterministic, quenched or annealed? Differences in the parameter estimation of heterogeneous network models

03/05/2023

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by   Marzio Di Vece, et al.

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Analysing weighted networks requires modelling the binary and weighted properties simultaneously. We highlight three approaches for estimating the parameters responsible for them: econometric techniques treating topology as deterministic and statistical techniques either ensemble-averaging parameters or maximising an averaged likelihood over the topological randomness. In homogeneous models, equivalence holds; in heterogeneous network models, the local disorder breaks it, in a way reminiscent of the difference between `quenched' and `annealed' averages in the physics of disordered systems.