Transmission of cultural traits in layered ego-centric networks

TL;DR

This paper investigates how layered ego-centric network structures influence the transmission and evolution of cultural traits, combining analytical mean-field results with numerical simulations to enhance understanding of social network effects.

Contribution

It introduces a layered ego-centric network model inspired by the social brain hypothesis to study cultural trait transmission and evolution.

Findings

Analytical mean-field approximation results for cultural transmission.

Validation of analytical results through extensive numerical simulations.

Insights into the impact of network structure on cultural evolution.

Abstract

Although a number of models have been developed to investigate the emergence of culture and evolutionary phases in social systems, one important aspect has not yet been sufficiently emphasized. This is the structure of the underlaying network of social relations serving as channels in transmitting cultural traits, which is expected to play a crucial role in the evolutionary processes in social systems. In this paper we contribute to the understanding of the role of the network structure by developing a layered ego-centric network structure based model, inspired by the social brain hypothesis, to study transmission of cultural traits and their evolution in social network. For this model we first find analytical results in the spirit of mean-field approximation and then to validate the results we compare them with the results of extensive numerical simulations.