Rise of an alternative majority against opinion leaders

K. Tucci, J.C. González-Avella and M.G. Cosenza

Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, 2016, vol. 446, issue C, 75-81

Abstract: We investigate the role of opinion leaders or influentials in the collective behavior of a social system. Opinion leaders are characterized by their unidirectional influence on other agents. We employ a model based on Axelrod’s dynamics for cultural interaction among social agents that allows for non-interacting states. We find three collective phases in the space of parameters of the system, given by the fraction of opinion leaders and a quantity representing the number of available states: one ordered phase having the state imposed by the leaders; another nontrivial ordered phase consisting of a majority group in a state orthogonal or alternative to that of the opinion leaders, and a disordered phase, where many small groups coexist. We show that the spontaneous rise of an alternative group in the presence of opinion leaders depends on the existence of a minimum number of long-range connections in the underlying network. This phenomenon challenges the common idea that influentials are fundamental to propagation processes in society, such as the formation of public opinion.

Keywords: Opinion leaders; Social dynamics; Alternative ordering (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:phsmap:v:446:y:2016:i:c:p:75-81

DOI: 10.1016/j.physa.2015.11.022

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