Social influence: The Usage History heuristic

Bary S.R. Pradelski

Mathematical Social Sciences, 2023, vol. 123, issue C, 105-113

Abstract: Individual behavior such as choice of fashion, adoption of new products, and selection of means of transport, is influenced by taking account of others’ actions. We study social influence in a heterogeneous population and analyze the behavior of the dynamic processes. Prior work has assumed that agents are influenced by the Adoption Ratio. We introduce a new heuristic of social influence where agents are influenced by the Usage History. We study perturbed dynamics andidentify their stable equilibria and long-run frequencies. We then show that social influence through Usage History generates qualitatively different dynamics than the classic model of social influence through Adoption Ratio. Moreover, the processes leave characteristic footprints; Usage History favors more extreme outcomes than Adoption Ratio.

Keywords: Social influence; Imitation; Equilibrium selection (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:matsoc:v:123:y:2023:i:c:p:105-113

DOI: 10.1016/j.mathsocsci.2023.03.003

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