scholarly journals Social information and spontaneous emergence of leaders in human groups

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (151) ◽  
pp. 20180938 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shinnosuke Nakayama ◽  
Elizabeth Krasner ◽  
Lorenzo Zino ◽  
Maurizio Porfiri
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Test ◽  
Network Centrality ◽  
Simple Majority ◽  
Time Varying ◽  
Simple Majority Rule ◽  
Group Leaders ◽  
Past Performance ◽  
Group Behaviour ◽  
Marketing Social ◽  
Group Member

Understanding the dynamics of social networks is the objective of interdisciplinary research ranging from animal collective behaviour to epidemiology, political science and marketing. Social influence is key to comprehending emergent group behaviour, but we know little about how inter-individual relationships emerge in the first place. We conducted an experiment where participants repeatedly performed a cognitive test in a small group. In each round, they were allowed to change their answers upon seeing the current answers of other members and their past performance in selecting correct answers. Rather than following a simple majority rule, participants granularly processed the performance of others in deciding how to change their answers. Toward a network model of the experiment, we associated a directed link of a time-varying network with every change in a participant's answer that mirrored the answer of another group member. The rate of growth of the network was not constant in time, whereby links were found to emerge faster as time progressed. Further, repeated interactions reinforced relationships between individuals' performance and their network centrality. Our results provide empirical evidence that inter-individual relationships spontaneously emerge in an adaptive way, where good performers rise as group leaders over time.

Institution-Induced Stability

2019 ◽  
pp. 84-102
Author(s):  
Kenneth A. Shepsle
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Majority Rule ◽  
Institutional Arrangements ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Lewis Carroll ◽  
Simple Majority ◽  
Simple Majority Rule ◽  
Technical Literature ◽  
Marquis De Condorcet ◽  
Charles Dodgson

Simple majority rule is badly behaved. This is one of the earliest lessons learned by political scientists in the positive political theory tradition. Discovered and rediscovered by theorists over the centuries (including, famously, the Majorcan Franciscan monk Raymon Llull in the thirteenth century, the Marquis de Condorcet in the eighteenth, the Reverend Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) in the eighteenth, and Duncan Black in the twentieth), the method of majority rule cannot be counted on to produce a rational collective choice. In many circumstances (made precise in the technical literature), it is very likely (a claim also made precise) that whatever choice is produced will suffer the property of not being “best” in the preferences of all majorities: for any candidate alternative, there will always exist another alternative that some majority prefers to it. This chapter suggests that while a collection of preferences often cannot provide a collectively “best” choice, institutional arrangements, which restrict comparisons of alternatives, may allow majority rule to function more smoothly. That is, where equilibrium induced by preferences alone may fail to exist, institutional structure may induce stability.

Democratic Federalism

2020 ◽  
pp. 99-138
Author(s):  
Robert P. Inman ◽  
Daniel L. Rubinfeld
Keyword(s):  
Public Goods ◽  
Economic Efficiency ◽  
Local Governments ◽  
Majority Rule ◽  
National Government ◽  
Democratic Participation ◽  
Simple Majority ◽  
Simple Majority Rule ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
National Legislature

This chapter details the likely economic, democratic, and rights performance of a decentralized national legislature with representatives elected from geographically specified local districts. The national legislature is assigned responsibility for national public goods and services and national regulations. Decisions in the legislature are made by simple majority rule. Independent local governments continue to be responsible for important local services, perhaps provided concurrently with the national government. On the dimensions of democratic participation and the protection of rights and liberties, Democratic Federalism is likely to do well, provided all citizens are represented in the legislature. It is on the dimension of economic efficiency that legislature-only Democratic Federalism is most likely to fall short.

When Do Conflicting Parties Share Political Power?

2015 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-151 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marco Battaglini ◽  
Lydia Mechtenberg
Keyword(s):  
Majority Rule ◽  
Political Power ◽  
Small Extent ◽  
Simple Majority ◽  
Proportional Rule ◽  
Simple Majority Rule ◽  
Electoral Outcome ◽  
Costly Punishment ◽  
Voting Rule ◽  
Do So

AbstractWe conduct a laboratory experiment to study the incentives of a privileged group (the “yellows”) to share political power with another group (the “blues”). The yellows collectively choose the voting rule for a general election: a simple-majority rule that favors them, or a proportional rule. In two treatments, the blues can use a costly punishment option. We find that the yellows share power voluntarily only to a small extent, but they are more inclined to do so under the threat of punishment, despite the fact that punishments are not sub-game perfect. The blue group conditions punishments both on the voting rule and the electoral outcome.

Barriers and Facilitators to Implementing Exercise is Medicine Canada on Campus Groups

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (5) ◽  
pp. 751-759
Author(s):  
Brittany M. McEachern ◽  
Julia Jackson ◽  
Susan Yungblut ◽  
Jennifer R. Tomasone
Keyword(s):  
Thematic Analysis ◽  
Health Care Professionals ◽  
Barriers And Facilitators ◽  
Semistructured Interview ◽  
Group Leaders ◽  
Local Contexts ◽  
Health Initiatives ◽  
Inner Setting ◽  
Group Member ◽  
Common Barriers

The Exercise is Medicine Canada on Campus (EIMC-OC) program was established in 2013 to provide opportunities for students to promote physical activity in their campus communities. Currently, 38 EIMC-OC groups are in operation, and each has encountered challenges and enablers that have yet to be formally documented. This project aimed to (1) identify barriers and facilitators when implementing an EIMC-OC group and (2) investigate levels of implementation at which the barriers and facilitators operate. Throughout winter 2016, 22 EIMC-OC group leaders representing 12 groups contributed data. Participants completed a survey and a semistructured interview developed using the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR). Interviews were transcribed and underwent thematic analysis. Eighteen barriers and 24 facilitators were identified, with four influencers cited as both a barrier and a facilitator. Common barriers included group member time constraints and communicating with health care professionals. Common facilitators included collaborating with other groups and advertising. Most influencers corresponded to the inner setting and process CFIR domains. Findings from this study suggest that EIMC-OC groups face similar barriers and facilitators despite varying local contexts. The influencers identified highlight recommendations to enhance the success of the EIMC-OC program and other multisite health initiatives at academic institutions.

Convergence and Restricted Preference Maximizing under Simple Majority Rule: Results from a Computer Simulation of Committee Choice in Two-Dimensional Space

2001 ◽  
Vol 95 (1) ◽  
pp. 155-167 ◽  
Author(s):  
David H. Koehler
Keyword(s):  
Computer Simulation ◽  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Collective Choice ◽  
Simple Majority ◽  
Two Dimensional ◽  
Central Tendency ◽  
Simple Majority Rule ◽  
Individual Decisions ◽  
Political Decisions ◽  
Formal Procedures

Recent analyses of collective choice predict convergence among the outcomes of simple-majority decisions. I estimate the extent of convergence under restricted preference maximizing through a computer simulation of majority choice by committees in which individual decisions on proposal location and voting are constrained. The simulation generates distributions of majority-adopted proposals in two-dimensional space: nondeterministic outcomes of simple-majority choice. The proposal distributions provide data for a quantitative evaluation of the effects on convergence of relaxing conventional preference-maximizing assumptions. I find convergence of majority-adopted proposals in all cases, and that convergence increases under restricted proposal location. Moreover, under some voting restrictions, experiments yield stable outcomes that demonstrate remarkable convergence. I conclude that restricted preference maximizing generally increases the probability that simple-majority outcomes reflect the central tendency of member preference distributions. Since committees and legislatures are important formal procedures for democratic collective choice, this conclusion applies to a large class of political decisions.

Between the expert and majority rules

2003 ◽  
Vol 35 (4) ◽  
pp. 941-960 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Berend ◽  
Luba Sapir
Keyword(s):  
Majority Rule ◽  
Simple Majority ◽  
Simple Majority Rule ◽  
Expert Rule ◽  
Special Cases ◽  
The Family ◽  
Majority Rules

Sapir (1998) calculated the probabilities of the expert rule and of the simple majority rule being optimal under the assumption of exponentially distributed logarithmic expertise levels. Here we find the analogous probabilities for the family of restricted majority rules, including the above two extreme rules as special cases, and the family of balanced expert rules. We compare the two families, the rules within each family, and all rules of the two families with the extreme rules.

Voting Procedures: A Summary Analysis

1983 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 181-208 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hannu Nurmi
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Majority Rule ◽  
Collective Decision ◽  
Collective Decision Making ◽  
Simple Majority ◽  
Simple Majority Rule ◽  
Research Tradition ◽  
Voting Procedures ◽  
Marquis De Condorcet ◽  
Condorcet Paradox

Roughly two centuries ago the Marquis de Condorcet and Chevalier Jean-Charles de Borda originated a research tradition – by no means a continuous one – that over the decades has produced results casting doubt on many widely used collective decision-making procedures. The phenomenon known as the Condorcet effect or the Condorcet paradox is the well-known problem of the simple majority rule. The paradox bearing the name of Borda is less commonly known, but it also relates to a procedure that is widely used, namely the plurality principle. Either one of these paradoxes is serious enough to make these procedures suspect unless one is convinced that the situations giving rise to these paradoxical features are extremely rare. In this article we review some voting procedures that have been introduced in the literature. We aim at giving a synthesis of the assessments of procedures with respect to various criteria.

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