Bibliographic Details
| Title: |
Influencing Opinions of Heterogeneous Populations over Finite Time Horizons |
| Authors: |
Saxena, Arunabh, Kumar, Bhumesh, Gupta, Anmol, Sahasrabudhe, Neeraja, Moharir, Sharayu |
| Publication Year: |
2019 |
| Collection: |
Computer Science |
| Subject Terms: |
Computer Science - Social and Information Networks, Electrical Engineering and Systems Science - Systems and Control |
| More Details: |
In this work, we focus on strategies to influence the opinion dynamics of a well-connected society. We propose a generalization of the popular voter model. This variant of the voter model can capture a wide range of individuals including strong-willed individuals whose opinion evolution is independent of their neighbors as well as conformist/rebel individuals who tend to adopt the opinion of the majority/minority. Motivated by political campaigns which aim to influence opinion dynamics by the end of a fixed deadline, we focus on influencing strategies for finite time horizons. We characterize the nature of optimal influencing strategies as a function of the nature of individuals forming the society. Using this, we show that for a society consisting of predominantly strong-willed/rebel individuals, the optimal strategy is to influence towards the end of the finite time horizon, whereas, for a society predominantly consisting of conformist individuals who try to adopt the opinion of the majority, it could be optimal to influence in the initial phase of the finite time horizon. |
| Document Type: |
Working Paper |
| Access URL: |
http://arxiv.org/abs/1905.04448 |
| Accession Number: |
edsarx.1905.04448 |
| Database: |
arXiv |
