Positive and negative effects of social impact on evolutionary vaccination game in networks

TL;DR

This paper investigates how social influence affects voluntary vaccination behaviors in networks, revealing both positive and negative impacts depending on network heterogeneity and vaccination costs, with implications for disease prevention strategies.

Contribution

It introduces a simulation study analyzing social impact on vaccination in networks, highlighting how network structure and costs influence vaccination behavior.

Findings

Social impact can both promote and hinder vaccination.

Heterogeneous networks enhance vaccination effectiveness at low costs.

Social impact may increase risk in homogeneous networks.

Abstract

Preventing infectious disease like flu from spreading to large communities is one of the most important issues for humans. One effective strategy is voluntary vaccination, however, there is always the temptation for people refusing to be vaccinated because once herd immunity is achieved, infection risk is greatly reduced. In this paper, we study the effect of social impact on the vaccination behavior resulting in preventing infectious disease in networks. The evolutionary simulation results show that the social impact has both positive and negative effects on the vaccination behavior. Especially, in heterogeneous networks, if the vaccination cost is low, the behavior is more promoted than the case without social impact. In contrast, if the cost is high, the behavior is reduced compared to the case without social impact. Moreover, the vaccination behavior is effective in heterogeneous networks more than in homogeneous networks. This implies that the social impact puts people at risk in homogeneous networks. We also evaluate the results from the social cost related to the vaccination policy.