Effects of the Interaction Between Ideological Affinity and Psychological Reaction of Agents on the Opinion Dynamics in a Relative Agreement Model

Abstract

Ideology is one of the defining elements of opinion dynamics. In this paper, we report the effects of the nonlinear interaction of ideological affinity with the psychological reaction of agents in the frame of a multiparametric mathematical model of opinion dynamics. Computer simulations of artificial networked societies composed of agents of two psychological types were used for studying opinion formation; the simulations showed a phenomenon of preferential self-organization into groups of ideological affinity at the first stages of opinion evolution. The separation into ideologically akin opinion groups (ideological affinity) was more notable in societies composed mostly of concord agents; a larger opinion polarization was associated with the increase of agents’ initial average opinion uncertainty. We also observed a sensibility of opinion dynamics to the initial conditions of opinion and uncertainty, indicating potential instabilities. A measure of convergence was introduced to facilitate the analysis of transitions between the opinion states of networked societies and to detect social instability events. We found that the average of opinion uncertainty distribution reaches a steady state with values lower than the initial average value, sometimes nearing zero, which points at socially apathetic agents. Our analyses showed that the model can be utilized for further investigation on opinion dynamics and can be extended to other social phenomena.