Emergence of metapopulations and echo chambers in mobile agents

TL;DR

This paper presents a simple multi-agent model demonstrating how homophily, social influence, and confirmation bias lead to the emergence of physical segregation (metapopulations) and opinion echo chambers, reflecting offline and online social dynamics.

Contribution

It introduces a novel model combining mobility and opinion dynamics, showing how these factors produce segregation and echo chambers in social systems.

Findings

Physical proximity causes opinion convergence among agents.

Homophily and social influence lead to stable metapopulation formations.

Confirmation bias fosters coexistence of diverse opinions within groups.

Abstract

Multi-agent models often describe populations segregated either in the physical space, i.e. subdivided in metapopulations, or in the ecology of opinions, i.e. partitioned in echo chambers. Here we show how the interplay between homophily and social influence controls the emergence of both kinds of segregation in a simple model of mobile agents, endowed with a continuous opinion variable. In the model, physical proximity determines a progressive convergence of opinions but differing opinions result in agents moving away from each others. This feedback between mobility and social dynamics determines to the onset of a stable dynamical metapopulation scenario where physically separated groups of like-minded individuals interact with each other through the exchange of agents. The further introduction of confirmation bias in social interactions, defined as the tendency of an individual to favor opinions that match his own, leads to the emergence of echo chambers where different opinions can coexist also within the same group. We believe that the model may be of interest to researchers investigating the origin of segregation in the offline and online world.