Noisy Hegselmann-Krause Systems: Phase Transition and the 2R-Conjecture

详细信息    查看全文

• 作者：Chu Wang ; Qianxiao Li ; Weinan E ; Bernard Chazelle
• 关键词：Collective behavior ; Opinion dynamics ; Cluster formation ; Phase transition ; Dynamic networks
• 刊名：Journal of Statistical Physics
• 出版年：2017
• 出版时间：March 2017
• 年：2017
• 卷：166
• 期：5
• 页码：1209-1225
• 全文大小：
• 刊物类别：Physics and Astronomy
• 刊物主题：Statistical Physics and Dynamical Systems; Theoretical, Mathematical and Computational Physics; Physical Chemistry; Quantum Physics;
• 出版者：Springer US
• ISSN：1572-9613
• 卷排序：166

文摘

The classic Hegselmann-Krause (HK) model for opinion dynamics consists of a set of agents on the real line, each one instructed to move, at every time step, to the mass center of the agents within a fixed distance R. In this work, we investigate the effects of noise in the continuous-time version of the model as described by its mean-field Fokker-Planck equation. In the presence of a finite number of agents, the system exhibits a phase transition from order to disorder as the noise increases. We introduce an order parameter to track the phase transition and resolve the corresponding phase diagram. The system undergoes a phase transition for small R but none for larger R. Based on the stability analysis of the mean-field equation, we derive the existence of a forbidden zone for the disordered phase to emerge. We also provide a theoretical explanation for the well-known 2R conjecture, which states that, for a random initial distribution in a fixed interval, the final configuration consists of clusters separated by a distance of roughly 2R. Our theoretical analysis confirms previous simulations and predicts properties of the noisy HK model in higher dimension.