Phase transition in a similarity-based model

PINTO, SEBASTIÁN; BALENZUELA, PABLO

Congreso; StatPhys 27; 2019

The Axelrod model has been proposed as a model of cultural dissemination in a society in which two mechanism (very well known in social dynamics: Social influence andhomophily) give rise to a transition between homogeneous and heterogeneous collective states. Even though the model has two parameters, we found that this transitiondepends only on a combination of these ones, which can be interpreted as the fraction of links with initial zero-similarity. This observation led us to propose a simple modelin terms of similarity between agents, which reproduces the main features of the transition in the Axelrod model. We explore the dynamics of this new model, and study theanalogies and discrepancies respect to other well known transitions, such as those from random networks and bond percolation.