Community Detection in Networks using Node Attributes and Modularity

Abstract

Community detection in network is of vital importance to find cohesive subgroups. Node attributes can improve the accuracy of community detection when combined with link information in a graph. Community detection using node attributes has not been investigated in detail. To explore the aforementioned idea, we have adopted an approach by modifying the Louvain algorithm. We have proposed Louvain-AND-Attribute (LAA) and Louvain-OR-Attribute (LOA) methods to analyze the effect of using node attributes with modularity. We compared this approach with existing community detection approaches using different datasets. We found the performance of both algorithms better than Newman’s Eigenvector method in achieving modularity and relatively good results of gain in modularity in LAA than LOA. We used density, internal and external edge density for the evaluation of quality of detected communities. LOA provided highly dense partitions in the network as compared to Louvain and Eigenvector algorithms and close values to Clauset. Moreover, LOA achieved few numbers of edges between communities.