Modeling Dynamic Web Polarization and Proximity Depolarization Processes by Compactness Measures

In this paper, we deal with the possibility of simulating dynamic polarization and proximity depolarization processes in a software multi-agent community, modeling homophily and trust relationships usually present in human processes. Group polarization involves various disciplines, such as economics, social psychology, political science, sociology and many others, and it can be considered a critical process underlying relevant behaviors as, for instance, voting and conflictual intergroup relations in the society. Moreover, being a human social phenomenon, the polarization processes are subject to change over time or also effect overturning (i.e., depolarization). Our contribution consists of proposing a compactness-based model for equipping agents in order to simulate the complexity of such processes. We have simulated two case studies where polarization is ruled by compactness measures, combining similarity and trust with different percentages. We evaluated the results provided by compactness measures in order to verify the role of similarity and trust in the agent polarization processes.