An Alter-Centric Interpretation of Social Network Centrality in Health Care Organizations.

Tracking social network dynamics among professionals in a hospital department, we investigate the role of alters' motivation in explaining change in ego's network position over time. Motivational orientations affect the kind of co-workers with whom health care professionals preferentially interact in the hospital, such that professionals high in communal motives prefer to establish ties with co-workers occupying central positions in organizational social networks. This effect driven by motivation results in a systematic network centrality bias: the personal network of central professionals (i.e. individuals with many incoming ties from colleagues) contains more supportive and altruistic people than the personal network of professionals who are less central (individuals with fewer incoming ties). Our findings contribute to a better understanding of the alter-centric psychological foundations of professionals' network centrality and call for further empirical research on how alters' motives affect the development of an individual's social networks in health care organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]