Interacting discovery processes on complex networks

TL;DR

This paper introduces a model of collective discovery on social networks, demonstrating how social structure influences individual exploration rates and the overall innovation process.

Contribution

It presents a novel network-based urn model that incorporates social interactions to study collective exploration and discovery dynamics.

Findings

Discovery pace depends on network centrality.

Social structure significantly influences exploration behavior.

Analytical and numerical results confirm the impact of network topology.

Abstract

Innovation is the driving force of human progress. Recent urn models reproduce well the dynamics through which the discovery of a novelty may trigger further ones, in an expanding space of opportunities, but neglect the effects of social interactions. Here we focus on the mechanisms of collective exploration and we propose a model in which many urns, representing different explorers, are coupled through the links of a social network and exploit opportunities coming from their contacts. We study different network structures showing, both analytically and numerically, that the pace of discovery of an explorer depends on its centrality in the social network. Our model sheds light on the role that social structures play in discovery processes.