genealogicaladjacent

Genealogicaladjacent is a neologism used to describe proximity between two individuals within a genealogical network or pedigree. The term combines genealogy with adjacency to express the idea of closeness in a kinship chart, typically measured by the shortest path between two people in a graph of kinship ties. It is not a standardized term, but a descriptive one employed in discussions of data linkage and network analysis.

Definition and metrics: In a standard pedigree graph, where edges represent parent–child relationships, two individuals are genealogically adjacent if the shortest path between them has a length at most a chosen threshold k. Common choices are k = 1 for direct kin (such as parent and child) or k = 2 for close relatives like siblings or grandchild–grandparent pairs. Some uses incorporate additional edges for marriage or affinity ties, which can alter adjacency distances. The threshold k is adjustable and depends on the analytical goal and the supplied data.

Uses: The concept appears in genealogical informatics and data science to describe proximity for record matching, deduplication, privacy risk assessment (such as kin-network anonymization), and network analyses of family structures. It helps researchers and practitioners identify near-relatives in incomplete or consolidated datasets, or to model relationships in simulations.

Limitations: Adjacency assessments depend on the chosen graph model and the edges included. Different data sources, representations of non-blood ties, and generation labeling can yield different results for the same pair of individuals, so the term remains sensitive to methodological choices.

See also: kinship, pedigree graph, degrees of relationship, record linkage, privacy in genealogical data.