Physica A 392 (2013) 5678–5684 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Physica A journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/physa The relationships between electricity consumption and GDP in Asian countries, using hierarchical structure methods Ersin Kantar a,b,∗ , Mustafa Keskin a a Department of Physics, Erciyes University, 38039 Kayseri, Turkey b Institute of Science, Erciyes University, 38039 Kayseri, Turkey highlights • The relationships between EC and GDP in Asian countries are studied. • We constructed networks by using hierarchical structure methods. • We carried out bootstrap technique to determine the reliability of the links. • We used average linkage cluster analysis to observe cluster structures much better. • A strong relationship between energy consumption and economic growth is found. article info Article history: Received 16 April 2013 Received in revised form 7 July 2013 Available online 31 July 2013 Keywords: Electricity consumption Economic growth Asian countries Hierarchical structure methods Bootstrap technique Cluster analysis abstract This study uses hierarchical structure methods (minimal spanning tree (MST) and hierar- chical tree (HT)) to examine the relationship between energy consumption and economic growth in a sample of 30 Asian countries covering the period 1971–2008. These countries are categorized into four panels based on the World Bank income classification, namely high, upper middle, lower middle, and low income. In particular, we use the data of elec- tricity consumption and real gross domestic product (GDP) per capita to detect the topolog- ical properties of the countries. We show a relationship between electricity consumption and economic growth by using the MST and HT. We also use the bootstrap technique to investigate a value of the statistical reliability to the links of the MST. Finally, we use a clus- tering linkage procedure in order to observe the cluster structure. The results of the struc- tural topologies of these trees are as follows: (i) we identified different clusters of countries according to their geographical location and economic growth, (ii) we found a strong rela- tionship between energy consumption and economic growth for all income groups consid- ered in this study and (iii) the results are in good agreement with the causal relationship between electricity consumption and economic growth. © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Economists, physicists and mathematicians have examined the statistical properties of stock market relationships (cor- relations, fluctuations, etc.) in the price movements of different stocks to understand stock market dynamics. In this way, the structure of stock markets has become one of the most intensively studied subjects in economics, finance and econo- physics [1–22]. Moreover, real-life systems have been able to successfully describe the topological properties and charac- teristics [23–33]. ∗ Corresponding author at: Department of Physics, Erciyes University, 38039 Kayseri, Turkey. Tel.: +90 352 207666x33136; fax: +90 352 4374931. E-mail addresses: ersinkantar@erciyes.edu.tr, ersin_kantar@yahoo.com (E. Kantar). 0378-4371/$ – see front matter © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.physa.2013.07.029