Social Networks and the Aggregation of Individual Decisions

Social Networks and the Aggregation of Individual Decisions PDF Author: D. Lee Heavner
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Decision making
Languages : en
Pages : 23

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Book Description
This paper analyzes individual decisions to participate in an activity and the aggregation of those decisions when individuals gather information about the outcomes and choices of (a few) others in their social network. In this environment, aggregate participation rates are generally inefficient. Increasing the size of social networks does not necessarily increase efficiency and can lead to less efficient long-run outcomes. Both subsidies for participation and penalties for non-participation can increase participation rates, though not necessarily by the same amount. Punishing non-participation has much greater effects on participation rates than rewarding participation when current rates are very low. A program that provides youth with mentors who have participated themselves can increase participation rates, especially when those rates are low. Finally, communities plagued by the flight of successful participants will experience lower short- and long-run participation rates

Social Networks and the Aggregation of Individual Decisions

Social Networks and the Aggregation of Individual Decisions PDF Author: D. Lee Heavner
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Decision making
Languages : en
Pages : 23

Get Book Here

Book Description
This paper analyzes individual decisions to participate in an activity and the aggregation of those decisions when individuals gather information about the outcomes and choices of (a few) others in their social network. In this environment, aggregate participation rates are generally inefficient. Increasing the size of social networks does not necessarily increase efficiency and can lead to less efficient long-run outcomes. Both subsidies for participation and penalties for non-participation can increase participation rates, though not necessarily by the same amount. Punishing non-participation has much greater effects on participation rates than rewarding participation when current rates are very low. A program that provides youth with mentors who have participated themselves can increase participation rates, especially when those rates are low. Finally, communities plagued by the flight of successful participants will experience lower short- and long-run participation rates

Social Networks and the Aggragation of Individual Decisions

Social Networks and the Aggragation of Individual Decisions PDF Author: D. Lee Heavner
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 23

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Book Description


Spread of MisInformation in Social Networks

Spread of MisInformation in Social Networks PDF Author: Daron Acemoglu
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Common fallacies
Languages : en
Pages : 57

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Book Description
We provide a model to investigate the tension between information aggregation and spread of misinformation in large societies (conceptualized as networks of agents communicating with each other). Each individual holds a belief represented by a scalar. Individuals meet pairwise and exchange information, which is modeled as both individuals adopting the average of their pre-meeting beliefs. When all individuals engage in this type of information exchange, the society will be able to effectively aggregate the initial information held by all individuals. There is also the possibility of misinformation, however, because some of the individuals are "forceful," meaning that they influence the beliefs of (some) of the other individuals they meet, but do not change their own opinion. The paper characterizes how the presence of forceful agents interferes with information aggregation. Under the assumption that even forceful agents obtain some information (however infrequent) from some others (and additional weak regularity conditions), we first show that beliefs in this class of societies converge to a consensus among all individuals. This consensus value is a random variable, however, and we characterize its behavior. Our main results quantify the extent of misinformation in the society by either providing bounds or exact results (in some special cases) on how far the consensus value can be from the benchmark without forceful agents (where there is efficient information aggregation). The worst outcomes obtain when there are several forceful agents and forceful agents themselves update their beliefs only on the basis of information they obtain from individuals most likely to have received their own information previously. Keywords: information aggregation, learning, misinformation, social networks. JEL Classifications: C72, D83.

Migration, Remittances, Poverty, and Human Capital

Migration, Remittances, Poverty, and Human Capital PDF Author: David McKenzie
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN: 0707061539
Category : Emigration and immigration
Languages : en
Pages : 16

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Book Description
This paper reviews common challenges faced by researchers interested in measuring the impact of migration and remittances on income, poverty, inequality, and human capital (or, in general, "welfare") as well as difficulties confronting development practitioners in converting this research into policy advice. On the analytical side, the paper discusses the proper formulation of a research question, the choice of the analytical tools, as well as the interpretation of the results in the presence of pervasive endogeneity in all decisions surrounding migration. Particular attention is given to the use of instrumental variables in migration research. On the policy side, the paper argues that the private nature of migration and remittances implies a need to carefully spell out the rationale for interventions. It also notices the lack of good migration data and proper evaluations of migration-related government policies. The paper focuses mainly on microeconomic evidence about international migration, but much of the discussion extends to other settings as well.

The Oxford Handbook of Social Networks

The Oxford Handbook of Social Networks PDF Author: Ryan Light
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190251778
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 768

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Book Description
While some social scientists may argue that we have always been networked, the increased visibility of networks today across economic, political, and social domains can hardly be disputed. Social networks fundamentally shape our lives and social network analysis has become a vibrant, interdisciplinary field of research. In The Oxford Handbook of Social Networks, Ryan Light and James Moody have gathered forty leading scholars in sociology, archaeology, economics, statistics, and information science, among others, to provide an overview of the theory, methods, and contributions in the field of social networks. Each of the thirty-three chapters in this Handbook moves through the basics of social network analysis aimed at those seeking an introduction to advanced and novel approaches to modeling social networks statistically. They cover both a succinct background to, and future directions for, distinctive approaches to analyzing social networks. The first section of the volume consists of theoretical and methodological approaches to social networks, such as visualization and network analysis, statistical approaches to networks, and network dynamics. Chapters in the second section outline how network perspectives have contributed substantively across numerous fields, including public health, political analysis, and organizational studies. Despite the rapid spread of interest in social network analysis, few volumes capture the state-of-the-art theory, methods, and substantive contributions featured in this volume. This Handbook therefore offers a valuable resource for graduate students and faculty new to networks looking to learn new approaches, scholars interested in an overview of the field, and network analysts looking to expand their skills or substantive areas of research.

Endogenous Time Preferences in Social Networks

Endogenous Time Preferences in Social Networks PDF Author: Marianna A. Klochko
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN: 9781781958001
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 296

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Book Description
'Peter Ordeshook is an outstanding scholar and is addressing a very important question. As he points out on the first page of Chapter 1, social norms do exist and are adhered to, constitutions survive, people cooperate with others in some settings, but not in others. The topic of this book is very exciting and important - this is a real winner.' - Elinor Ostrom, Indiana University, US Marianna Klochko and Peter Ordeshook address an under-studied issue from rational choice theory - the common assumption that individual time preferences are exogenous and fixed. They then present empirical evidence to suggest that this is not the case, exploring a computer simulation model that allows for the evolutionary change of time preferences. This is done, moreover, in the context of social networks that are themselves endogenously determined.

Trends in Computational Social Choice

Trends in Computational Social Choice PDF Author: Ulle Endriss
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1326912097
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 424

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Book Description
Computational social choice is concerned with the design and analysis of methods for collective decision making. It is a research area that is located at the interface of computer science and economics. The central question studied in computational social choice is that of how best to aggregate the individual points of view of several agents, so as to arrive at a reasonable compromise. Examples include tallying the votes cast in an election, aggregating the professional opinions of several experts, and finding a fair manner of dividing a set of resources amongst the members of a group -- Back cover.

Encyclopedia of Social Networks

Encyclopedia of Social Networks PDF Author: George A. Barnett
Publisher: SAGE Publications
ISBN: 1452266506
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 1113

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Book Description
Request a FREE 30-day online trial to this title at www.sagepub.com/freetrial This two-volume encyclopedia provides a thorough introduction to the wide-ranging, fast-developing field of social networking, a much-needed resource at a time when new social networks or "communities" seem to spring up on the internet every day. Social networks, or groupings of individuals tied by one or more specific types of interests or interdependencies ranging from likes and dislikes, or disease transmission to the "old boy" network or overlapping circles of friends, have been in existence for longer than services such as Facebook or YouTube; analysis of these networks emphasizes the relationships within the network . This reference resource offers comprehensive coverage of the theory and research within the social sciences that has sprung from the analysis of such groupings, with accompanying definitions, measures, and research. Featuring approximately 350 signed entries, along with approximately 40 media clips, organized alphabetically and offering cross-references and suggestions for further readings, this encyclopedia opens with a thematic Reader's Guide in the front that groups related entries by topics. A Chronology offers the reader historical perspective on the study of social networks. This two-volume reference work is a must-have resource for libraries serving researchers interested in the various fields related to social networks.

Individual Retweeting Behavior on Social Networking Sites

Individual Retweeting Behavior on Social Networking Sites PDF Author: Juan Shi
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 981157376X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 132

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Book Description
This book explores and analyzes influential predictors and the underlying mechanisms of individual content sharing/retweeting behavior on social networking sites (SNS) from an empirical perspective. Since Individual content sharing/ retweeting behavior expedites information dissemination, it is a critical mechanism of information diffusion on Twitter. Individual sharing/retweeting behavior does not appear to happen randomly. So, what factors lead to individual information dissemination behavior? What are the dominating predictors? How does the recipient make retweeting decisions? How do these influential predictors combine and by what mechanism do they influence an individual’s retweeting decisions? Furthermore, are there any differences in the process of individual retweeting decisions? If so, what causes such differences? In order to answer these previously unexplored questions and gain a holistic view of individual retweeting behavior, the authors examined people’s retweeting history on Twitter and obtained a real dataset containing more than 60 million Twitter posts. They then employed text mining and natural language processing techniques to extract useful information from social media content, and used various feature selection methods to identify a subset of salient features that have substantial effects on individual retweeting behavior. Lastly, they applied the Elaboration Likelihood Model to build an overarching theoretical framework to reveal the underlying mechanisms of individual retweeting behavior. Given its scope, this book will appeal to researchers interested in investigating information dissemination on social media, as well as to marketers and administrators who plan to use social networking sites as an important avenue for information dissemination.

Working Paper Series

Working Paper Series PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 600

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Book Description