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Social aggregation as a cooperative game

Author

Listed:
  • Vilone, Daniele
  • Guazzini, Andrea

Abstract

A new approach for the description of phenomena of social aggregation is suggested. On the basis of psychological concepts (as for instance social norms and cultural coordinates), we deduce a general mechanism for social aggregation in which different clusters of individuals can merge according to cooperation among the agents. In their turn, the agents can cooperate or defect according to the clusters’ distribution inside the system. The fitness of an individual increases with the size of its cluster, but decreases with the work the individual had to do in order to join it. In order to test the reliability of such a new approach, we introduce a couple of simple toy models with the features illustrated above. We see, from this preliminary study, how cooperation is the most convenient strategy only in the presence of very large clusters, while on the other hand it is not necessary to have one hundred percent of cooperators for reaching a totally ordered configuration with only one megacluster filling the whole system.

Suggested Citation

  • Vilone, Daniele & Guazzini, Andrea, 2011. "Social aggregation as a cooperative game," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 390(14), pages 2716-2727.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:phsmap:v:390:y:2011:i:14:p:2716-2727
    DOI: 10.1016/j.physa.2011.03.024
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