Evolutionary Game Analysis of Competitive Information Dissemination on Social Networks: An Agent-Based Computational Approach

Social networks are formed by individuals, in which personalities, utility functions, and interaction rules are made as close to reality as possible. Taking the competitive product-related information as a case, we proposed a game-theoretic model for competitive information dissemination in social networks. The model is presented to explain how human factors impact competitive information dissemination which is described as the dynamic of a coordination game and players’ payoff is defined by a utility function. Then we design a computational system that integrates the agent, the evolutionary game, and the social network. The approach can help to visualize the evolution of % of competitive information adoption and diffusion, grasp the dynamic evolution features in information adoption game over time, and explore microlevel interactions among users in different network structure under various scenarios. We discuss several scenarios to analyze the influence of several factors on the dissemination of competitive information, ranging from personality of individuals to structure of networks.