Predicting human group sizes with physics
Jan 2023, phys.org
People behaving like particles with spin: Only by knowing the average number of friends each person has, scientists were able to predict the group sizes of people in a computer game, modeled on the self-organization of particles with spin, and with social stress as comparable to energy in physics.This model was able to predict the distribution of group size in the multiplayer online game Pardus. "Normally you would need to know the structure of the network and how it is designed," Korbel explains the results. "Here we only need to know how many friends a player has on average." With this relatively small amount of information, the researchers were able to predict how many groups of a certain size would appear.
via Complexity Science Hub Vienna: Jan Korbel et al, Homophily-Based Social Group Formation in a Spin Glass Self-Assembly Framework, Physical Review Letters (2023). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.130.057401
Exploring the neural mechanisms behind how social networks shape our decisions
Mar 2023, phys.org
"Essentially, our brain tends to assign higher weight to the observations by better connected neighbors and down-weight or even ignore the observations by less connected neighbors, even when these neighbors have valuable information," Zhu explained. "We found that activity in a part of our brain called dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, which typically implicated in adjusting our behavior to adapt to the external environment, tracks how well connected a neighbor is at the time when the brain is processing a decision observed from the neighbor."
Which is interesting because we know that novel information comes from the outside fringe people who are less connected to any one group, yet hold more connections to more otherwise un-connected groups...
via Peking University: Yaomin Jiang et al, Neurocomputational mechanism of real-time distributed learning on social networks, Nature Neuroscience (2023). DOI: 10.1038/s41593-023-01258-y.
How miscommunication can be constructive during problem-solving in diverse groups
Mar 2023, phys.org
"Higher-ability groups tend to think about a problem in the same way when making predictions or finding solutions," explains Muldoon. "They end up exploring the same spots. Diverse groups collectively are able to explore more options, increasing the chance of bigger successes.""Some miscommunication can make errors worse, while other examples of miscommunication can diminish the harm that might come from those errors,""What we found is that how we organize groups matters a great deal when we're evaluating the benefits of diversity—especially when we can miscommunicate,"
via University of Buffalo: Keith Hankins et al, Does (mis)communication mitigate the upshot of diversity?, PLOS ONE (2023). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0283248
Unrelated image credit: Stanford Torus by Alexander Preuss
No comments:
Post a Comment