Web address:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/
110725190044.htm
Minority Rules: Scientists Discover Tipping Point for the Spread of Ideas
enlarge
In this visualization, we see the tipping point where minority opinion (shown
in red) quickly becomes majority opinion. Over time, the minority opinion
grows. Once the minority opinion reached 10 percent of the population, the
network quickly changes as the minority opinion takes over the original
majority opinion (shown in green). (Credit: SCNARC/Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute)
ScienceDaily (July 26, 2011) Scientists at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
have found that when just 10 percent of the population holds an unshakable
belief, their belief will always be adopted by the majority of the society. The
scientists, who are members of the Social Cognitive Networks Academic Research
Center (SCNARC) at Rensselaer, used computational and analytical methods to
discover the tipping point where a minority belief becomes the majority
opinion. The finding has implications for the study and influence of societal
interactions ranging from the spread of innovations to the movement of
political ideals.
"When the number of committed opinion holders is below 10 percent, there is no
visible progress in the spread of ideas. It would literally take the amount of
time comparable to the age of the universe for this size group to reach the
majority," said SCNARC Director Boleslaw Szymanski, the Claire and Roland
Schmitt Distinguished Professor at Rensselaer. "Once that number grows above 10
percent, the idea spreads like flame."
As an example, the ongoing events in Tunisia and Egypt appear to exhibit a
similar process, according to Szymanski. "In those countries, dictators who
were in power for decades were suddenly overthrown in just a few weeks."
The findings were published in the July 22, 2011, early online edition of the
journal Physical Review E in an article titled "Social consensus through the
influence of committed minorities."
An important aspect of the finding is that the percent of committed opinion
holders required to shift majority opinion does not change significantly
regardless of the type of network in which the opinion holders are working. In
other words, the percentage of committed opinion holders required to influence
a society remains at approximately 10 percent, regardless of how or where that
opinion starts and spreads in the society.
To reach their conclusion, the scientists developed computer models of various
types of social networks. One of the networks had each person connect to every
other person in the network. The second model included certain individuals who
were connected to a large number of people, making them opinion hubs or
leaders. The final model gave every person in the model roughly the same number
of connections. The initial state of each of the models was a sea of
traditional-view holders. Each of these individuals held a view, but were also,
importantly, open minded to other views.
Once the networks were built, the scientists then "sprinkled" in some true
believers throughout each of the networks. These people were completely set in
their views and unflappable in modifying those beliefs. As those true believers
began to converse with those who held the traditional belief system, the tides
gradually and then very abruptly began to shift.
"In general, people do not like to have an unpopular opinion and are always
seeking to try locally to come to consensus. We set up this dynamic in each of
our models," said SCNARC Research Associate and corresponding paper author
Sameet Sreenivasan. To accomplish this, each of the individuals in the models
"talked" to each other about their opinion. If the listener held the same
opinions as the speaker, it reinforced the listener's belief. If the opinion
was different, the listener considered it and moved on to talk to another
person. If that person also held this new belief, the listener then adopted
that belief.
"As agents of change start to convince more and more people, the situation
begins to change," Sreenivasan said. "People begin to question their own views
at first and then completely adopt the new view to spread it even further. If
the true believers just influenced their neighbors, that wouldn't change
anything within the larger system, as we saw with percentages less than 10."
The research has broad implications for understanding how opinion spreads.
"There are clearly situations in which it helps to know how to efficiently
spread some opinion or how to suppress a developing opinion," said Associate
Professor of Physics and co-author of the paper Gyorgy Korniss. "Some examples
might be the need to quickly convince a town to move before a hurricane or
spread new information on the prevention of disease in a rural village."
The researchers are now looking for partners within the social sciences and
other fields to compare their computational models to historical examples. They
are also looking to study how the percentage might change when input into a
model where the society is polarized. Instead of simply holding one traditional
view, the society would instead hold two opposing viewpoints. An example of
this polarization would be Democrat versus Republican.
The research was funded by the Army Research Laboratory (ARL) through SCNARC,
part of the Network Science Collaborative Technology Alliance (NS-CTA), the
Army Research Office (ARO), and the Office of Naval Research (ONR).
The research is part of a much larger body of work taking place under SCNARC at
Rensselaer. The center joins researchers from a broad spectrum of fields --
including sociology, physics, computer science, and engineering -- in exploring
social cognitive networks. The center studies the fundamentals of network
structures and how those structures are altered by technology. The goal of the
center is to develop a deeper understanding of networks and a firm scientific
basis for the newly arising field of network science. More information on the
launch of SCNARC can be found at
http://news.rpi.edu/update.do?artcenterkey=2721&setappvar=page(1)
Szymanski, Sreenivasan, and Korniss were joined in the research by Professor of
Mathematics Chjan Lim, and graduate students Jierui Xie (first author) and
Weituo Zhang.
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Story Source:
The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by ScienceDaily
staff) from materials provided by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Journal Reference:
J. Xie, S. Sreenivasan, G. Korniss, W. Zhang, C. Lim, B. Szymanski. Social
consensus through the influence of committed minorities. Physical Review E,
2011; 84 (1) DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevE.84.011130
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Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (2011, July 26). Minority rules: Scientists
discover tipping point for the spread of ideas. ScienceDaily. Retrieved July
27, 2011, from http://www.sciencedaily.com /releases/2011/07/110725190044.htm
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis
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ScienceDaily or its staff.
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