Towards a theory of collective phenomena: Consensus and attitude changes in groups

Abstract

This study presents the outline of a model for collective phenomena. A symmetrybreaking model combines a number of well-established social psychology hypotheses PRELIMINARY REMARKSThe finest and most distinctive aspect of our sciences concerns the study of collective phenomena. Yet, in both social and natural sciences, this aspect is most difficult and certainly rather recent. When facing this difficulty, the tendency is either to go back to the individual or to treat groups as collective individuals. Our purpose here is to carry further the study of these phenomena to fill the gap between individual and social descriptions. We will proceed combining established psychological concepts with those from contemporary statistical physics (Haken, 1977; Reif, 1965;

Sociophysics: a personal testimony

“…While I was in New York, I met by chance S. Moscovici, a leading French social psychologist, who appeared rather interested in the adventure. We then start a very fruitful few years cooperation, which yielded a series of papers published during 1991-1995, most of them in the European Journal of Social Psychology [20][21][22][23][24]. But again, I got no feedback, except one invited paper in a book edited by a social scientist [25].…”

Opinion particles: Classical physics and opinion dynamics

“…However, we must also remember that, unlike the CODA case, that led us to inertia, the objective here is to obtain an equivalent to a force component. In Equation 11, we see that a force component enters as a term with ∆t 2 , while, if we repeat the argument that associated C with velocity, we will just have a ∆t. More importantly, very simple simulations of the limit ∆t → 0 show that a term ∆t 2 is required in order for the dynamics to have a proper limit.…”

“…In Opinion Dynamics problems [10,11,12,13,14,15,16], a framework based on Bayesian methods has been proposed [17] as an extension of the ideas presented in the Continuous Opinions and Discrete Actions (CODA) model [15,18]. It is interesting to notice that this framework is able to generate many of the other Opinion Dynamics models, both discrete [19] and continuous [26], as particular or limit cases.…”

Opinion dynamics within a virtual small group: the stubbornness effect

“…Festinger's vision can well summarize the intertwined relationship between the individuals and the social environment, between personal opinion and the opinion of the group. The consensus and attitude changes in groups have been in the latest years the target of different approaches ranging from physics to social and cognitive sciences [34][35][36][37]. The public opinion and the public debates are today crucial ingredients in modern society policy making [38], and the dynamics of such processes are affected by a several factors ranging from the individual resistance to the change to the collective beliefs effect and the minorities role in the breaking of democratic opinion dynamics [7,39].…”