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The Naming Game in social networks: community formation and consensus engineering

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Abstract

We study the dynamics of the Naming Game (Baronchelli et al. in J Stat Mech Theory Exp P06014, 2006b) in empirical social networks. This stylized agent-based model captures essential features of agreement dynamics in a network of autonomous agents, corresponding to the development of shared classification schemes in a network of artificial agents or opinion spreading and social dynamics in social networks. Our study focuses on the impact that communities in the underlying social graphs have on the outcome of the agreement process. We find that networks with strong community structure hinder the system from reaching global agreement; the evolution of the Naming Game in these networks maintains clusters of coexisting opinions indefinitely. Further, we investigate agent-based network strategies to facilitate convergence to global consensus.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, Applied Physics and Astronomy, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 110 8th Street, Troy, NY, 12180-3590, USA

    Qiming Lu & G. Korniss

  2. Department of Computer Science, Center for Pervasive Computing and Networking, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 110 8th Street, Troy, NY, 12180-3590, USA

    Boleslaw K. Szymanski

Authors
  1. Qiming Lu
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  2. G. Korniss
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  3. Boleslaw K. Szymanski
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Correspondence to G. Korniss.

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Lu, Q., Korniss, G. & Szymanski, B.K. The Naming Game in social networks: community formation and consensus engineering. J Econ Interact Coord 4, 221–235 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11403-009-0057-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11403-009-0057-7

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