Zealotry Effects on Opinion Dynamics in the Adaptive Voter Model

TL;DR

This paper investigates how zealots influence opinion spreading in an adaptive voter model with co-evolving network topology, revealing thresholds and strategies for controlling opinion dominance.

Contribution

It extends the adaptive voter model to include zealots on dynamic networks and analyzes their influence depending on network parameters and zealot connectivity.

Findings

Low zealot density can spread opinion below fragmentation threshold.

Zealots need higher connectivity than normal nodes beyond the transition point.

Adjusting rewiring rate or node connections can prevent zealot opinion dominance.

Abstract

The adaptive voter model has been widely studied as a conceptual model for opinion formation processes on time-evolving social networks. Past studies on the effect of zealots, i.e. nodes aiming to spread their fixed opinion throughout the system, only considered the voter model on a static network. Here, we extend the study of zealotry to the case of an adaptive network topology co-evolving with the state of the nodes and investigate opinion spreading induced by zealots depending on their initial density and connectedness. Numerical simulations reveal that below the fragmentation threshold a low density of zealots is sufficient to spread their opinion to the whole network. Beyond the transition point, zealots must exhibit an increased degree as compared to ordinary nodes for an efficient spreading of their opinion. We verify the numerical findings using a mean-field approximation of the model yielding a low-dimensional set of coupled ordinary differential equations. Our results imply that the spreading of the zealot opinion in the adaptive voter model is strongly dependent on the rate of link rewiring and the average degree of normal nodes in comparison with that of the zealots. In order to avoid a complete dominance of the zealots' opinion, there are two possible strategies for the remaining nodes: adjusting the rate of rewiring and/or the number of connections with other nodes, respectively.