IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0189107.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Evolution of language: An empirical study at eBay Big Data Lab

Author

Listed:
  • David Bodoff
  • Ron Bekkerman
  • Julie Dai

Abstract

The evolutionary theory of language predicts that a language will tend towards fewer synonyms for a given object. We subject this and related predictions to empirical tests, using data from the eBay Big Data Lab which let us access all records of the words used by eBay vendors in their item titles, and by consumers in their searches. We find support for the predictions of the evolutionary theory of language. In particular, the mapping from object to words sharpens over time on both sides of the market, i.e. among consumers and among vendors. In addition, the word mappings used on the two sides of the market become more similar over time. Our research contributes to the literature on language evolution by reporting results of a truly unique large-scale empirical study.

Suggested Citation

  • David Bodoff & Ron Bekkerman & Julie Dai, 2017. "Evolution of language: An empirical study at eBay Big Data Lab," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(12), pages 1-17, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0189107
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0189107
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0189107
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0189107&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0189107?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dirk Helbing & Wenjian Yu & Karl-Dieter Opp & Heiko Rauhut, 2014. "Conditions for the Emergence of Shared Norms in Populations with Incompatible Preferences," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 9(8), pages 1-14, August.
    2. Axelrod, Robert, 1986. "An Evolutionary Approach to Norms," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 80(4), pages 1095-1111, December.
    3. Van Huyck, John & Battalio, Raymond & Mathur, Sondip & Van Huyck, Patsy & Ortmann, Andreas, 1995. "On the Origin of Convention: Evidence from Symmetric Bargaining Games," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 24(2), pages 187-212.
    4. Cubitt, Robin P. & Sugden, Robert, 2003. "Common Knowledge, Salience And Convention: A Reconstruction Of David Lewis' Game Theory," Economics and Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 19(2), pages 175-210, October.
    5. Michael K. Mauws & Nelson Phillips, 1995. "Crossroads Understanding Language Games," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 6(3), pages 322-334, June.
    6. Martin A. Nowak & Natalia L. Komarova & Partha Niyogi, 2002. "Computational and evolutionary aspects of language," Nature, Nature, vol. 417(6889), pages 611-617, June.
    7. H. Peyton Young, 1996. "The Economics of Convention," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 10(2), pages 105-122, Spring.
    8. Erez Lieberman & Jean-Baptiste Michel & Joe Jackson & Tina Tang & Martin A. Nowak, 2007. "Quantifying the evolutionary dynamics of language," Nature, Nature, vol. 449(7163), pages 713-716, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chong Ho Yu, 2018. "Limitations and Prospects of Skyrmsian Evolutionary Game Theory in the Perspectives of Genotype Phenotype Mapping and Evolutionary Psychology," International Journal of Applied and Physical Sciences, Dr K.Vivehananthan, vol. 4(3), pages 81-91.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Safarzynska, Karolina & van den Bergh, Jeroen C.J.M., 2011. "Beyond replicator dynamics: Innovation-selection dynamics and optimal diversity," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 78(3), pages 229-245, May.
    2. Agnès Festré, 2010. "Incentives And Social Norms: A Motivation‐Based Economic Analysis Of Social Norms," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(3), pages 511-538, July.
    3. Francisco José León, 2011. "Peer loyalty and quota restriction as social norms: A case study of their emergence," Rationality and Society, , vol. 23(1), pages 75-115, February.
    4. Dirk Helbing & Anders Johansson, 2010. "Cooperation, Norms, and Revolutions: A Unified Game-Theoretical Approach," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 5(10), pages 1-15, October.
    5. Brousseau, Eric & Garrouste, Pierre & Raynaud, Emmanuel, 2011. "Institutional changes: Alternative theories and consequences for institutional design," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 79(1-2), pages 3-19, June.
    6. Parshad, Rana D. & Bhowmick, Suman & Chand, Vineeta & Kumari, Nitu & Sinha, Neha, 2016. "What is India speaking? Exploring the “Hinglish” invasion," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 449(C), pages 375-389.
    7. H Peyton Young, 2014. "The Evolution of Social Norms," Economics Series Working Papers 726, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    8. Maarten C.W. Janssen, 1997. "Focal Points," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 97-091/1, Tinbergen Institute.
    9. Fischer, Ilan & Sullivan, Oriel, 2007. "Evolutionary modeling of time-use vectors," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 62(1), pages 120-143, January.
    10. Runolfsson Solvason Birgir T., 1992. "Ordered Anarchy: Evolution Of The Decentralized Legal Order In The Icelandic Commonwealth," Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines, De Gruyter, vol. 3(2-3), pages 1-20, June.
    11. William Tracy, 2014. "Paradox Lost: The Evolution of Strategies in Selten’s Chain Store Game," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 43(1), pages 83-103, January.
    12. Ball, Richard, 2017. "Violations of monotonicity in evolutionary models with sample-based beliefs," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 100-104.
    13. Olav Schram Stokke, 1990. "The Northern Environment: Is Cooperation Coming?," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 512(1), pages 58-68, November.
    14. Jung-Kyoo Choi, 2008. "Play locally, learn globally: group selection and structural basis of cooperation," Journal of Bioeconomics, Springer, vol. 10(3), pages 239-257, December.
    15. David Schüller & Thorsten Upmann, 2013. "When Focal Points are Out of Focus: A Game-Theoretic Analysis of Come Dine with Me," CESifo Working Paper Series 4138, CESifo.
    16. Licht Amir N., 2008. "Social Norms and the Law: Why Peoples Obey the Law," Review of Law & Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 4(3), pages 715-750, December.
    17. Grubb, Farley, 2000. "The Statutory Regulation of Colonial Servitude: An Incomplete-Contract Approach," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 42-75, January.
    18. Michael T Gastner & Károly Takács & Máté Gulyás & Zsuzsanna Szvetelszky & Beáta Oborny, 2019. "The impact of hypocrisy on opinion formation: A dynamic model," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(6), pages 1-21, June.
    19. Bakalis, Evangelos & Galani, Alexandra, 2012. "Modeling language evolution: Aromanian, an endangered language in Greece," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 391(20), pages 4963-4969.
    20. Mauricio G. Villena & Marcelo J. Villena, 2004. "Evolutionary Game Theory and Thorstein Veblen’s Evolutionary Economics: Is EGT Veblenian?," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(3), pages 585-610, September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0189107. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.