From Social to Epidemic Criticality and Back

TL;DR

This paper explores how social opinion dynamics influence the spread of epidemics in networks, demonstrating that sociological debates can induce criticality and self-organization in epidemic processes.

Contribution

It introduces a multilayer network model linking social opinions and epidemic spread, showing how social debates can control and shape epidemic criticality and clustering.

Findings

Sociological interactions can induce phase transitions in epidemic spread.

Debates create clusters of safe sex advocates and opponents at criticality.

Feedback mechanisms lead to self-organized criticality in social-epidemic networks.

Abstract

We study the spread of a simulated epidemic in a network of individuals who may either contract a disease through sexual contact with an infected nearest neighbor or use safe sex practices under the influence of neighbors who are already adopting precautions. We show that both interaction between susceptible and infected individuals and the imitation of opinions concerning safe sex practices between individuals in favor of using such practices and those opposed to them leads to a phase transition. If the parameters of the epidemic are in the supercritical state, corresponding to an unlimited growth of infection, the interaction parameter of the sociological debate must also be in the supercritical state to control the spread of infection, and bring the system to criticality. Adopting a theoretical perspective like that of multilayer complex networks, we study the case where the epidemic network is under the influence of the above-mentioned sociological debate. We show that at criticality this debate generates clusters of individuals in favor of safe sex practices and clusters of individuals opposing their use. We study the influence of a sociological debate on whether to use safe sex or not, on the spreading of sexually transmitted infections. We show that due to this debate in the epidemic network a pattern mirroring the structures of the sociological network appears. Finally, we introduce a feedback of the epidemic network on the sociological network and prove that due to this feedback the sociological system undergoes a process of self-organization keeping it at criticality. We hope that these results have the effect of giving interesting suggestions to behavioral psychologists and information scientists actively involved in the analysis of the social debate on the moral issues connected to sexual activities.