by Erica Naone, Technology Review
In a paper published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from Cornell University describe a model for predicting how a social group will break apart during a turbulent split. Jon Kleinberg, a professor of computer science at Cornell, who led the work, says researchers have traditionally focused on predicting how a group will look once the conflict has shaken out. He says this work proposes a way of looking at the process of the split itself. Kleinberg notes that his group’s model doesn’t apply to every situation. Instead, it portrays extremely polarizing conflicts. A sociological theory called “structural balance” describes the decisions that group members are forced to make when a group splits completely apart. The model best fits ” situations where the logic starts to become, ‘If you’re not with me, you’re against me,'” Kleinberg says.
http://www.technologyreview.com/web/28827/?mod=chfeatured
Share on Facebook