Conceptual representations of animal social networks: an overview

Networks are now widely used to represent, quantify and model animal behaviour. These approaches have proved valuable in linking individual behaviours to emergent population level patterns and quantifying the implications of these population structures for wider ecological and evolutionary processes. However, there are diverse conceptual representations of network data and choosing the right tool to answer a particular question can be challenging. Here I provide an overview of different network representations, highlighting their potential applications in behavioural ecology and drawing attention to key resources to help with their implementation. My aim is to provide an accessible guide that helps behavioural ecologists take full advantage of the potential of the different ways in which their data can be used to generate social other networks. •A guide of different approaches to represent animal social network data.•An overview of how to employ and when best to use different network representations.•Introduction to less used methods such as multigraphs, and signed and ego networks.•Case study showing association data as bipartite, dyadic and higher-order networks.