期刊名称：Discussion Papers in Economics / Department of Economics, University of Surrey
出版年度：2014
出版社：University of Surrey
摘要：We model the di↵usion of two types of information through a population under theassumption that communication time is limited. When a meeting between individuals occurs,at most one information can be communicated. Preferences over information typesdivide the population into two groups, and if a choice has to be made about which informationto communicate, members of either group will choose their preferred information.We find that crowding out of information does occur, but information is rarely eradicatedentirely. Somewhat surprisingly, the parameter values under which a unique informationwould survive in the population are sufficient for both information to survive. Only if informationpreferences in the entire population are aligned, i.e., every individual prefers tocommunicate the same information, does the second information die out. We apply ourframework to answer questions on the impact that segregation has on information di↵usionand polarization. We find that segregation unambiguously increases polarization anddecreases the proportions of informed individuals, and derive the conditions under whichagents endogenously choose to segregate.
关键词：Social Networks; Information Transmission; Multiple States; Segregation
