Threshold Models of Collective Behavior
@article{Granovetter1978ThresholdMO, title={Threshold Models of Collective Behavior}, author={Mark S. Granovetter}, journal={American Journal of Sociology}, year={1978}, volume={83}, pages={1420 - 1443} }
Models of collective behavior are developed for situations where actors have two alternatives and the costs and/or benefits of each depend on how many other actors choose which alternative. The key concept is that of "threshold": the number or proportion of others who must make one decision before a given actor does so; this is the point where net benefits begin to exceed net costs for that particular actor. Beginning with a frequency distribution of thresholds, the models allow calculation of…
4,935 Citations
Subjective Expected Utility, Thresholds, and Recycling
- Economics
- 1999
Threshold models belonging to the rational choice paradigm are developed for situations in which actors have two behavior alternatives; the costs and/or benefits of each alternative are dependent on…
Coevolution of Decision‐Making and Social Environments
- Economics
- 2015
Social scientists have a longstanding theoretical interest in the relationship between individual behavior and social dynamics. A growing body of work demonstrates that, when human behavior is…
Consensus and Equilibria in the Presence of Self-Interest and Conformity in Social Groups
- Economics
- 2017
This paper analyses the decision-making processes of heterogeneous agents, when both individual preferences and group actions are taken into account. Under the assumptions of certain topologies of…
Formal Models of Collective Action
- Economics
- 1993
This review focuses on formal theories and models of collective action. There are many types of collective action, and they cannot all be captured with the same formal model. Four types of models are…
SUBJECTIVE RATIONALITY OF INITIATORS AND OF THRESHOLD-THEORETICAL BEHAVIOR OF FOLLOWERS IN COLLECTIVE ACTION
- Psychology
- 2000
This article brings a rational-choice perspective to bear on (1) some utility characteristics of people who initiate collective action and (2) reasons why such initiators' actions induce followers…
Social Influence, Binary Decisions and Collective Dynamics
- Economics
- 2008
In this paper we address the general question of how social influence determines collective outcomes for large populations of individuals faced with binary decisions. First, we define conditions…
Decision Accuracy and the Role of Spatial Interaction in Opinion Dynamics
- Mathematics
- 2013
The opinions and actions of individuals within interacting groups are frequently determined by both social and personal information. When sociality (or the pressure to conform) is strong and…
Behavioral experiments on biased voting in networks
- EconomicsProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- 2009
There are well-studied network topologies in which the minority preference consistently wins globally; that the presence of “extremist” individuals, or the awareness of opposing incentives, reliably improve collective performance; and that certain behavioral characteristics of individual subjects, such as “stubbornness,” are strongly correlated with earnings.
Networks of conforming or nonconforming individuals tend to reach satisfactory decisions
- EconomicsProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- 2016
The results reveal that irregular network topology, population heterogeneity, and partial synchrony are not sufficient to cause cycles or nonconvergence in linear-threshold dynamics; rather, other factors such as imitation or the coexistence of coordinating and anticoordinating agents must play a role.
A Theory of the Critical Mass. I. Interdependence, Group Heterogeneity, and the Production of Collective Action
- EconomicsAmerican Journal of Sociology
- 1985
Collective action usually depends on a "critical mass" that behaves differently from typical group members. Sometimes the critical mass provides some level of the good for others who do nothing,…
References
SHOWING 1-10 OF 54 REFERENCES
Dynamic models of segregation
- Economics
- 1971
The systemic effects are found to be overwhelming: there is no simple correspondence of individual incentive to collective results, and a general theory of ‘tipping’ begins to emerge.
Note on the drawing power of crowds of different size.
- Psychology
- 1969
This study reports on the relationship between the size of a stimulus crowd, standing on a busy city street looking up at a building, and the response of passersby. As the size of the stimulus crowd…
Some empirical patterns in a riot process.
- PsychologyAmerican sociological review
- 1974
Detailed temporal and spatial data on over 1,850 instances of crowd action recorded during the Los Angeles riot are categorized, quantified and analyzed and indicate the need for studies which approach collective violence as a complex, diverse, dynamic and interactive behavioral process.
The Causes of Racial Disturbances: A Comparison of Alternative Explanations
- Psychology
- 1969
A range of hypotheses of varying specificity is examined in this paper in an attempt to account for the location of racial disorders during the 1960's. The initial sections consider what general…
A Gaming Approach to Crowd Behavior
- Psychology
- 1974
Social science analyses which try to incorporate human mental processes are fraught with problems. The very existence of "mind" as a distinct structure has been debated at length with no resolution…
CHAIN MIGRATION, ETHNIC NEIGHBORHOOD FORMATION AND SOCIAL NETWORKS.
- SociologyThe Milbank Memorial Fund quarterly
- 1964
This paper draws attention to the possibilities of illuminating current problems by historical studies on the sociology of migration and labor force reorganization in the past in Europe and North America.
Delinquency and Drift
- Law
- 1966
The first C. Wright Mills Award-winning book, Delinquency and Drift has become a recognized classic in the fields of criminology and social problems. In it, Matza argues persuasively that delinquent…
Structural characteristics of cities and the severity of racial disorders.
- PsychologyAmerican sociological review
- 1976
It is found that disorder severity declined as a function of the number of prior outbreaks in a city and there is evidence for a temporal effect, with the post-Martin Luther King-assassination disturbances having been unusually destructive.
Economics
- EconomicsThe Indian medical gazette
- 1870
Introduction to game theory; and market analysis through classical/neoclassical and game theoretic approaches.
Studies of independence and conformity: I. A minority of one against a unanimous majority.
- Psychology
- 1956
The investigations described in this series are concerned with the conditions of independence and lack of independence in the face of group pressure. The abstract temper of present-day theory and…