Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Social Networks journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/socnet Inequality in social capital in Chile: Assessing the importance of network size and contacts’ occupational prestige on status attainment Dante Contreras a, ⁎ , Gabriel Otero b , Juan D. Díaz c , Nicolás Suárez d a Department of Economics, Faculty of Economics and Business, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile, Diagonal Paraguay 257, Santiago Centro, Santiago, Chile, 8330015, Santiago, Chile b Department of Sociology, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands c Department of Management Control and Information Systems, Faculty of Economics and Business, Universidad de Chile, Chile d Department of Economics, Faculty of Economics and Business, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Social capital Contacts Network size Job prestige Income Status attainment ABSTRACT Long-standing literature argues that social capital is closely implicated in labour market outcomes. However, this hypothesis has yet to be tested in Latin America, the most unequal region in the world. We focus on Chile, one of the most stratifed countries in Latin America. This study examines the relationship between social capital and four measures of status attainment, including job prestige and employment income. We use data from the frst wave of the Longitudinal Social Study of Chile (ELSOC), a representative survey of the Chilean urban population aged 18–75 years. We analyse a subsample of 1,351 individuals who are currently employed. A Bayesian model of over-dispersion with relational data is used to estimate the size of the network, a novel measure of social capital. We analyse the data set using linear and logistic regression models and a complementary path analysis, frst estimating models for the entire sample, and then splitting the sample into three groups to evaluate dif- ferences within individuals’ socioeconomic background. Results indicate that contacts’ occupational prestige has a positive association with job prestige and employment income, while the size of the network increases in- dividuals’ salaries and labour participation. We also observe that social capital fows through stratifed networks which tend to favour individuals from high socioeconomic backgrounds. We discuss the need to conduct more in-depth evaluations of how better creation of social capital and its efects on status attainment could be closely linked to positions of privilege and advantage accumulation processes in highly unequal contexts. Introduction Understanding the formation of social networks is a relevant sci- entifc challenge because personal connections play an important role in shaping people’s opportunities in life (Marin and Wellman, 2011). Assessing the relationship between social capital and status attainment has been one of the most important topics in the literature (see Lin, 2001). Research on this issue has widely demonstrated that social ca- pital is strongly associated with several outcome variables, namely la- bour market entry (e.g. Verhaeghe et al., 2015), job satisfaction (e.g. Flap and Volker, 2001), searching for or changing jobs (e.g. Granovetter, 1975; Tian and Lin, 2016), job prestige (e.g. Campbell et al., 1986; Chen and Volker, 2016; Lin et al., 1981; Lin and Dumin, 1986; Son and Lin, 2012; Volker and Flap, 1999), and employment income (e.g. Bian et al., 2015; Boxman et al., 1991; Bridges and Villemez, 1986; De Graaf et al., 1988). In this research agenda, the Social Resources Theory (SRT) and later formulations developed by Nan Lin have become infuential (Lin, 2001, 1999, 1982; Lin et al., 1981; Lin and Dumin, 1986). He defnes social capital as the socioeconomic resources embedded in individuals’ social networks. This is an instrumental approach on the study of social ca- pital focused on the returns that can be obtained through individuals' contacts (see also Bourdieu, 1986; Flap and Volker, 2004; Lin and Erickson, 2008), and difers from a more collective view that regards social capital as a set of functions of social life (e.g. Putnam, 2000). Following this instrumental approach, the main goal of this paper is to test the relationship between social capital and labour market out- comes in Chile. Specifcally, we analyse a logical sequence of status attainment that principally includes job prestige and employment in- come. We contribute to the literature on social capital and status at- tainment in three ways. First, we examine a novel context that could be useful for expanding the discussion of social capital towards emerging countries. To date, the relationship between social capital and status attainment has mostly https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socnet.2019.02.002 ⁎ Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: dcontrer@fen.uchile.cl (D. Contreras), gabriel.otero@uva.nl (G. Otero), juadiaz@fen.uchile.cl (J.D. Díaz), nsuarez@fen.uchile.cl (N. Suárez). Social Networks 58 (2019) 59–77 0378-8733/ © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. T