Explosive opinion spreading with polarization and depolarization via asymmetric perception

TL;DR

This paper investigates how asymmetric perception of opinions can cause rapid polarization and depolarization in social networks, revealing phase transition phenomena and hysteresis effects through analytical and numerical methods.

Contribution

It introduces a mean-field model with nonlinear incidence to explain explosive opinion polarization and hysteresis in structured communities.

Findings

Asymmetric perception leads to explosive polarization.

Hysteresis causes abrupt depolarization.

Nonlinear incidence results in first-order phase transitions.

Abstract

Polarization significantly influences societal divisions across economic, political, religious, and ideological lines. Understanding these mechanisms is key to devising strategies to mitigate such divisions and promote depolarization. Our study examines how asymmetric opinion perception, modeled through nonlinear incidence terms, affects polarization and depolarization within structured communities. We demonstrate that such asymmetry leads to explosive polarization and causes a hysteresis effect responsible for abrupt depolarization. We develop a mean-field approximation to explain how nonlinear incidence results in first-order phase transitions and the nature of bifurcations. This approach also helps in understanding how opinions polarize according to underlying social network communities and how these phenomena intertwine with the nature of such transitions. Numerical simulations corroborate the analytical findings.