Opinion formation in networked societies with strong leaders

Abstract

Recent studies show that many types of human social activities, from scientific collaborations to sexual contacts, can be understood in terms of complex network of interactions. Such networking paradigm allows to model many aspects of social behaviour with relatively simple computer models. The present work investigates the influence of single leaders on opinion formation within simulations of agent based artificial networked societies. Several types of network systems (among them random networks, highly clustered, small world and scale-free) are studied. The strength of the social influence of individuals is assumed to be dictated by distance from an agent to another, as well as individual strengths of the agents. We study the effect of different topologies on the conditions of general acceptance of leader's opinion by the society.