Hyejin Youn is Associate Professor of Strategic Management & International Business at at Graduate School of Business at Seoul National University and external faculty at Santa Fe Institute. Before joining SNU in 2024, Hyejin was Associate Professor at Kellogg School of Management, and research fellow at at the Santa Fe Institute, Oxford University, MIT Media Lab, and Harvard Kennedy School. Hyejin received B.S and Ph. D in Physics (Statistical Physics) at KAIST.

Hyejin's expertise lies in complex systems and computational social science, asking how systems scale and evolve. Her research focuses on developing mathematical and computational frameworks to bridge micro- and macro-level dynamics for social phenomena, using big data and computational models such as scaling theory, network science, and statistical models. These include cities (comprising of individuals), innovation paradigm shifts (comprising of individual combinational tweaks), and societal narrative (comprising of story motifs). As such, the studies are encompassing small to large scale, and highly interdisciplinary ranging mathematics, biology, computer science, economics, sociology, and anthropology, reflected in her a broad range of publications including PNAS, Nature Human Behaviour, Nature Communications, Science Advances, Physical Review Letters, Research Policy, Evolutionary Anthropology, Journal of Language Evolution, Scientific Report, EPJ Data Science, PLOS One and Theory in Biosciences.

In addition to academic efforts, Hyejin has been engaging with broader audiences through interviews with media outlets, including Physics Today, The Economist, Forbes, NBC News, WIRED, Bloomberg, MIT Technology Review, Scientific American, and New Scientist. She has also served as an Associate Editor for Management Science, PLOS ONE, and Complexity (a Nature partner journal). Furthermore, she has advised and reviewed multi-million-dollar projects for the U.S. National Science Foundation, to contribute the academic community.

These include“URoL:EN: Towards a unified theory of regulatory functions and networks across biological and social systems” National Science Foundation, EF-2133863, $2,200,000 as Lead PI and "Understanding Technological Change from the Map of Capabilities.” National Science Foundation SciSIP, EAGER (USA), No. SMA-1312294, $152,500, as PI, and “Quantifying Complex Systems" National Research Foundation (Korea) ca. $10,000 as PI.

For more information, visit website (hyoun.me) and Google Scholar.

[Academic Positions]

1. What makes Individual I's a Collective We; Coordination mechanisms & costs
   J. Yoon, C. Kempes, V. Chuqiao Yang, G. West, H. Youn
   working paper arXiv:2306.02113 [physics.soc-ph] [updated version].

2. Deconstructing Human Capital to Construct Hierarchical Nestedness
   M. Hosseinioun, F. Neffke, LT. Zhang, H.Youn
   working paper arXiv preprint arXiv:2303.15629 [updated version].

3. Deeply nested structure of mythological traditions worldwide
   H. Kim, M. J. Hamilton, W-S Jung, Y. Berezkin and H. Youn
   working paper working paper [updated version].

4. The impact of geographical distance on learning through collaboration
   F. Wouden, H.Youn
   Research Policy 522 [link].

5. Metrics and mechanisms: Measuring the unmeasurable in the science of scienceL
   Wu, A Kittur, H Youn, S Milojevic, E Leahey, SM Fiore, YY Ahn
   Journal of Informetrics 16101290 [link].

6. The universal pathway to innovative urban economies
   I. Hong, M. R. Frank, I. Rahwan, W.-S. Jung, H. Youn
   Science Advances 6:34, eaba4934 [link] [Phys.org].

7. Toward understanding the impact of artificial intelligence on labor M. R. Frank et al
   PNAS 116 (14) 6531-6539 [link] [Forbes].

8. Scaling and the Universality of Function Diversity Across Human Organizations
   V. Yang, C. P Kempes, H. Youn, S. Redner, G.B. West
   arXiv preprint arXiv:2208.06487[link] (2022)

9. Industrial Topics in Urban Labor System
   J Park, MR Frank, L Sun, H Youn
   arXiv preprint arXiv:2009.09799[link] (2020)

10. Small cities face greater impact from automation.
    M.R. Frank, L. Sun, M. Cebrian, H. Youn, I. Rahwan
    J. R. Soc. Interface 15:20170946 [link], [COVER][MIT Technology Review][New Scientist] [Kellogg Insight]

11. Morphology of travel routes and the organization of cities
    Minjin Lee, Hugo Barbosa, Hyejin Youn, Gourab Ghoshal, Petter Holme
    Nature Communications 8:2229 [link], [Santa Fe Institute working paper]

12. On the universal structure of human lexical semantics
    H. Youn, L. Sutton, E. Smith, C. Moore, J. Wilkins, I. Maddieson, B. Croft, T. Bhattacharya,
    PNAS 113 (7) 1766R11;1771 [link] [project page]
    [Phys.org] , [Santa Fe Institute news], [Mathematical Institute news, University of Oxford], [PNAS highlights], [viz made by Quartz], [Nature], and in [National Geography]
    

13. Invention as a combinatorial process: Evidence from U.S. Patents
    H. Youn, J. Lobo, L.M.A. Bettencourt, D. Strumsky
    J. R. Soc. Interface 12: 20150272 (2015). [Link] [arXiv]
    [the Economist] [MIT Technology Review] [Nature Physics].

14. Studying language evolution in the age of big data
    T. Bhattacharya, N. Retzlaff, D. E Blasi, W. Croft, C.D. Hruschka, I. Maddieson, L. Muller, E. Smith, P. F. Stadler, G. Starostin, H. Youn
    Journal of Language Evolution 3:2, 94R11;129 [link] (2018)

15. Dynamic burstiness of word-occurrence and network modularity in textbook systems
    XM. Cui, CN Yoon, H Youn, SH Lee, JS Jung, SK Han,
    Physica A 487:103-110 [link]
    

16. Technological novelty profile and inventions future impact
    D. Kim, D. Burkhardt Cerigo, H. Jeong, H. Youn
    EPJ Data Science 2016 5:8 [link], [Springer Blog]

17. Demographics and Democracy: A Network Analysis of Mongolians Political Cognition
    P. Sabloff, S. Thurner, R. Hanel, H. Youn
    Journal of Anthropological Research 73:617-646 [link].
    

18. Scaling and universality in urban economic diversification
    H. Youn, J. Lobo, D. Strumsky, H. Samaniego, G. B. West, L. Bettencourt
    J. R. Soc. Interface 13 20150937 (2016) [arXiv] [link]
    [Science of Cities] in Next City, and [Forbes].
    

19. The Hypothesis of Urban Scaling: formalization, implications, and challenges
    L. M. A. Bettencourt, J. Lobo, G. B. West, H. Youn
    [working paper] [ arXiv ]

20. The ecological and evolutionary energetics of hunter-gatherer residential mobility
    M. J. Hamilton, J. Lobo, E. Rupley, H. Youn, G. B. West
    Evolutionary Anthropology 25:124R11;132 (2016) [link] [arXiv] [Phys.Org]

21. Constructing cities, deconstructing scaling laws
    E. Arcaute, E. Hatna, P. Ferguson, H. Youn, A. Johansson, and M. Batty
    J. R. Soc. Interface 12 20140745 (2014) [Link]

22. Professional diversity and the productivity of cities
    L. Bettencourt, H. Samaniego, H. Youn
    Scientific Reports 4, 5393 (2014) [arXiv] [Link] [WalletHub]

23. The geography and carbon footprint of mobile phone use in Cote d Ivoire
    V. Salnikov, D. Schien, H. Youn, R. Lambiotte, and M. Gastner
    EPJ Data Science 3, 3 (2013) [Link] [arXiv]

24. The Statistics of Urban Scaling and Their Connection to Zipf’s Law
    A. Gomez-Lievano, H. Youn, L. M. A. Bettencourt
    PLoS ONE 7(7) e40393 (2012) [Link]

25. Inefficiency in Networks with Multiple Sources and Sinks
    H. Youn, M. T. Gastner, H. Jeong
    Complex ‘2009 (USST, Shanghai, China, Feb. 23-25) [Link]

26. The Price of Anarchy in Transportation Networks: Efficiency and Optimality Control
    H. Youn, M. T. Gastner, H. Jeong
    Phys. Rev. Lett. 101 128701 [Link] [The Economist] [Scientific American] [News and Tribune] [Physics.org] [ArsTechnica]

27. Price of Anarchy on Boston Road Network
    H. Youn, F. Roth, M. Silver, M.-H. Cloutier, P. Ittzes, and H. Jeong
    J. Korean Phys. Soc. 48 217 [Link]