Cognitive network structure: an experimental study

TL;DR

This study experimentally analyzes how private and public messaging in a virtual community influence the emergent cognitive network structure, revealing distinct homogeneous and heterogeneous interaction patterns.

Contribution

It provides novel experimental insights into the structural differences between public and private communication networks and their relation to network dynamics.

Findings

Public messages lead to homogeneous networks.

Private messages create heterogeneous, strategic interactions.

Triangular clique analysis indicates network aging and dynamics.

Abstract

In this paper we present first experimental results about a small group of people exchanging private and public messages in a virtual community. Our goal is the study of the cognitive network that emerges during a chat seance. We used the Derrida coefficient and the triangle structure under the working assumption that moods and perceived mutual affinity can produce results complementary to a full semantic analysis. The most outstanding outcome is the difference between the network obtained considering publicly exchanged messages and the one considering only privately exchanged messages: in the former case, the network is very homogeneous, in the sense that each individual interacts in the same way with all the participants, whilst in the latter the interactions among different agents are very heterogeneous, and are based on "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" strategy. Finally a recent characterization of the triangular cliques has been considered in order to describe the intimate structure of the network. Experimental results confirm recent theoretical studies indicating that certain 3-vertex structures can be used as indicators for the network aging and some relevant dynamical features.