{"id":3295,"date":"2024-01-30T14:37:54","date_gmt":"2024-01-30T14:37:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/?p=3295"},"modified":"2024-04-19T12:09:56","modified_gmt":"2024-04-19T12:09:56","slug":"can-a-single-line-of-code-change-society","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/?p=3295","title":{"rendered":"JASSS: Can a Single Line of Code Change Society?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id='full_slider_1'  class='avia-fullwidth-slider main_color avia-shadow   avia-builder-el-0  el_before_av_one_third  avia-builder-el-first   container_wrap fullsize'  ><div  class='avia-slideshow av-lsaz2dd3-75077639893b83fa8b45f0fc16ffd54c avia-slideshow-featured av_slideshow_full avia-slide-slider av-slideshow-ui av-control-default av-slideshow-manual av-loop-once av-loop-manual-endless av-default-height-applied   avia-slideshow-1' data-slideshow-options=\"{&quot;animation&quot;:&quot;slide&quot;,&quot;autoplay&quot;:false,&quot;loop_autoplay&quot;:&quot;once&quot;,&quot;interval&quot;:5,&quot;loop_manual&quot;:&quot;manual-endless&quot;,&quot;autoplay_stopper&quot;:false,&quot;noNavigation&quot;:false,&quot;bg_slider&quot;:false,&quot;keep_padding&quot;:false,&quot;hoverpause&quot;:false,&quot;show_slide_delay&quot;:0}\"  itemprop=\"image\" itemscope=\"itemscope\" itemtype=\"https:\/\/schema.org\/ImageObject\" ><ul class='avia-slideshow-inner ' style='padding-bottom: 28.666666666667%;'><li  class='avia-slideshow-slide av-lsaz2dd3-75077639893b83fa8b45f0fc16ffd54c__0  av-single-slide slide-1 slide-odd'><div data-rel='slideshow-1' class='avia-slide-wrap '   ><div class='av-slideshow-caption av-lsaz2dd3-75077639893b83fa8b45f0fc16ffd54c__0 caption_fullwidth caption_right caption_right_framed caption_framed'><div class=\"container caption_container\"><div class=\"slideshow_caption\"><div class=\"slideshow_inner_caption\"><div class=\"slideshow_align_caption\"><h2 class='avia-caption-title '  itemprop=\"name\" >Can a Single Line of Code Change Society?<\/h2><div class='avia-caption-content '  itemprop=\"description\" ><p>The Systemic Risks of Optimizing Engagement in Recommender Systems on Global Information Flow, Opinion Dynamics and Social Structures. JASSS 27, 9.<br \/>\nChavalarias, D., Bouchaud, P., Panahi, M., 2024.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><img decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\" class=\"wp-image-3299 avia-img-lazy-loading-not-3299\"  src=\"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2024\/01\/JasssBanner-1500x430.png\" width=\"1500\" height=\"430\" title='JasssBanner' alt=''  itemprop=\"thumbnailUrl\"   \/><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><div id='after_full_slider_1'  class='main_color av_default_container_wrap container_wrap fullsize'  ><div class='container av-section-cont-open' ><div class='template-page content  av-content-full alpha units'><div class='post-entry post-entry-type-page post-entry-3295'><div class='entry-content-wrapper clearfix'>\n<div  class='flex_column av-dd1cv-5594f6bf0a14c155e91ce097590fb244 av_one_third  avia-builder-el-1  el_after_av_slideshow_full  el_before_av_one_third  avia-builder-el-first  first flex_column_div  '     ><section  class='av_textblock_section av-lsaznl57-53463db96fb98679473f0fc32c56ad02 '   itemscope=\"itemscope\" itemtype=\"https:\/\/schema.org\/BlogPosting\" itemprop=\"blogPost\" ><div class='avia_textblock'  itemprop=\"text\" ><div class=\"csl-bib-body\">\n<div><a href=\"http:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2024\/01\/logo_jasss@2x.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-3301\" src=\"http:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2024\/01\/logo_jasss@2x.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"299\" height=\"104\" srcset=\"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2024\/01\/logo_jasss@2x.png 666w, https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2024\/01\/logo_jasss@2x-300x105.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 299px) 100vw, 299px\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<div class=\"csl-entry\">Chavalarias, D., Bouchaud, P., Panahi, M., 2024. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jasss.org\/27\/1\/9.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Can a Single Line of Code Change Society? The Systemic Risks of Optimizing Engagement in Recommender Systems on Global Information Flow, Opinion Dynamics and Social Structures<\/a>. JASSS 27, 9.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/section><br \/>\n\n<style type=\"text\/css\" data-created_by=\"avia_inline_auto\" id=\"style-css-av-lsaz2vq3-de639efaedd2c840247d11352a4e3316\">\n#top .av-special-heading.av-lsaz2vq3-de639efaedd2c840247d11352a4e3316{\npadding-bottom:10px;\n}\nbody .av-special-heading.av-lsaz2vq3-de639efaedd2c840247d11352a4e3316 .av-special-heading-tag .heading-char{\nfont-size:25px;\n}\n.av-special-heading.av-lsaz2vq3-de639efaedd2c840247d11352a4e3316 .av-subheading{\nfont-size:15px;\n}\n<\/style>\n<div  class='av-special-heading av-lsaz2vq3-de639efaedd2c840247d11352a4e3316 av-special-heading-h3  avia-builder-el-3  el_after_av_textblock  el_before_av_textblock '><h3 class='av-special-heading-tag '  itemprop=\"headline\"  >Abstract<\/h3><div class=\"special-heading-border\"><div class=\"special-heading-inner-border\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><br \/>\n<section  class='av_textblock_section av-lsaz39v7-85a1addbe5e48ec2b84ebeb22c226b45 '   itemscope=\"itemscope\" itemtype=\"https:\/\/schema.org\/BlogPosting\" itemprop=\"blogPost\" ><div class='avia_textblock'  itemprop=\"text\" ><p>As the last few years have seen an increase in both online hostility and polarization, we need to move beyond the fact-checking reflex or the praise for better moderation on social networking sites (SNS) and investigate their impact on social structures and social cohesion. In particular, the role of recommender systems deployed by Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs) such as Facebook or Twitter has been overlooked. This paper draws on the literature on cognitive science, digital media, and opinion dynamics to propose a faithful replica of the entanglement between recommender systems, opinion dynamics and users&#8217; cognitive bias on SNSs like Twitter that is calibrated over a large scale longitudinal database of tweets from political activists. This model makes it possible to compare the consequences of various recommendation algorithms on the social fabric, to quantify their interaction with some major cognitive bias. In particular, we demonstrate that the recommender systems that seek to solely maximize users&#8217; engagement necessarily lead to a polarization of the opinion landscape, to a concentration of social power in the hands of the most toxic users and to an overexposure of users to negative content (up to 300% for some of them), a phenomenon called algorithmic negativity bias. Toxic users are more than twice as numerous in the top 1% of the most influential users than in the overall population. Overall, our results highlight the systemic risks generated by certain implementations of recommender systems and the urgent need to comprehensively identify implementations of recommender systems harmful to individuals and society. This is a necessary step in setting up future regulations for systemic SNSs, such as the European Digital Services Act.<\/p>\n<p>Keywords: <strong>Opinion Dynamics, Social Networking Sites, Recommender Systems, Cognitive Bias, Polarization, Complex Systems<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><\/p><\/div>\n<div  class='flex_column av-2iwqwf-d0b4dde02f9f3b271de62705267f8205 av_one_third  avia-builder-el-5  el_after_av_one_third  el_before_av_one_third  flex_column_div  '     ><p>\n<style type=\"text\/css\" data-created_by=\"avia_inline_auto\" id=\"style-css-av-lsazh0af-ec5a714e7f67c1a9ef6e709d29b88e11\">\n#top .av-special-heading.av-lsazh0af-ec5a714e7f67c1a9ef6e709d29b88e11{\npadding-bottom:10px;\n}\nbody .av-special-heading.av-lsazh0af-ec5a714e7f67c1a9ef6e709d29b88e11 .av-special-heading-tag .heading-char{\nfont-size:25px;\n}\n.av-special-heading.av-lsazh0af-ec5a714e7f67c1a9ef6e709d29b88e11 .av-subheading{\nfont-size:15px;\n}\n<\/style>\n<div  class='av-special-heading av-lsazh0af-ec5a714e7f67c1a9ef6e709d29b88e11 av-special-heading-h3  avia-builder-el-6  el_before_av_textblock  avia-builder-el-first '><h3 class='av-special-heading-tag '  itemprop=\"headline\"  >Take home messages<\/h3><div class=\"special-heading-border\"><div class=\"special-heading-inner-border\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><br \/>\n<section  class='av_textblock_section av-lsb0b7cz-bd2a2641b7eb88a004271d93c1da9a36 '   itemscope=\"itemscope\" itemtype=\"https:\/\/schema.org\/BlogPosting\" itemprop=\"blogPost\" ><div class='avia_textblock'  itemprop=\"text\" ><p><strong> Recommender systems that seek to solely maximize users&#8217; engagement pose systemic risks for our societies:<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>they necessarily lead to a polarization of the opinion landscape,<\/li>\n<li>they lead to a concentration of social power in the hands of the most toxic users<\/li>\n<li>they lead to an average\u00a0 +26% algorithmic negativity bias (cf. <a href=\"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/?p=2363\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Toxic Data<\/a>) <em>i.e.<\/em> an overexposure of users to negative content (up to 300% for some of them)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Advances on opinion dynamics modeling.<\/strong><br \/>\nThe calibration of model of opinion dynamics on real-world data (Twitter messages) show that :<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Influence between social media users, measured as the probability of retweeting a message, decays roughly exponentially as the difference of opinion increases, with some refinement revealing political strategies. This suggests that the tolerance of users relatively to distinct opinions is not a step function like in H-K models for example, but an exponentially decreasing one.<\/li>\n<li>The function for opinion fusion process that best fits the empirical data among the set of arithmetic and trigonometric functions when assuming an homogeneous functional form is the linear function, already widely used in the literature on opinion dynamics <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jasss.org\/27\/1\/9.html#ref-Deffuant_2000\">(Deffuant et al. 2000;<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.jasss.org\/27\/1\/9.html#ref-Jager_2005\"> Jager &amp; Amblard 2005).<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div><\/section><\/p><\/div>\n<div  class='flex_column av-alphwf-f80a6beeba918b2ffdadbec3aa9e2b0a av_one_third  avia-builder-el-8  el_after_av_one_third  avia-builder-el-last  flex_column_div  '     ><p>\n<style type=\"text\/css\" data-created_by=\"avia_inline_auto\" id=\"style-css-av-927967-46632dd27d157e868e245627f2aa463b\">\n#top .av-special-heading.av-927967-46632dd27d157e868e245627f2aa463b{\npadding-bottom:10px;\n}\nbody .av-special-heading.av-927967-46632dd27d157e868e245627f2aa463b .av-special-heading-tag .heading-char{\nfont-size:25px;\n}\n.av-special-heading.av-927967-46632dd27d157e868e245627f2aa463b .av-subheading{\nfont-size:15px;\n}\n<\/style>\n<div  class='av-special-heading av-927967-46632dd27d157e868e245627f2aa463b av-special-heading-h3  avia-builder-el-9  el_before_av_hr  avia-builder-el-first '><h3 class='av-special-heading-tag '  itemprop=\"headline\"  >Interactive visualization and resources<\/h3><div class=\"special-heading-border\"><div class=\"special-heading-inner-border\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><br \/>\n\n<style type=\"text\/css\" data-created_by=\"avia_inline_auto\" id=\"style-css-av-lsb0fj8b-e2f99a5474cb68aa8a14b3098a5aa100\">\n#top .hr.hr-invisible.av-lsb0fj8b-e2f99a5474cb68aa8a14b3098a5aa100{\nheight:50px;\n}\n<\/style>\n<div  class='hr av-lsb0fj8b-e2f99a5474cb68aa8a14b3098a5aa100 hr-invisible  avia-builder-el-10  el_after_av_heading  el_before_av_iconlist '><span class='hr-inner '><span class=\"hr-inner-style\"><\/span><\/span><\/div><br \/>\n<div  class='avia-icon-list-container av-7802f3-0c0e35c904e3c63c21a16d4df1df11d6  avia-builder-el-11  el_after_av_hr  avia-builder-el-last '><ul class='avia-icon-list avia_animate_when_almost_visible avia-icon-list-left av-iconlist-big av-7802f3-0c0e35c904e3c63c21a16d4df1df11d6 avia-iconlist-animate'>\n<li><a href='http:\/\/maps.gargantext.org\/maps\/opinionDynamics\/' title='Interactive State of the Art Maps'  target=\"_blank\"  rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" class='iconlist_icon av-lwe67-e3f489df6ad2d3c9fb57aad3c2a79fae avia-font-entypo-fontello avia-iconfont avia-font-entypo-fontello'><span class='av-icon-char' data-av_icon='\ue843' data-av_iconfont='entypo-fontello' aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/span><\/a><article class=\"article-icon-entry \"  itemscope=\"itemscope\" itemtype=\"https:\/\/schema.org\/BlogPosting\" itemprop=\"blogPost\" ><div class=\"iconlist_content_wrap\"><header class=\"entry-content-header\" aria-label=\"Icon: &lt;a href=&#039;http:\/\/maps.gargantext.org\/maps\/opinionDynamics\/&#039; title=&#039;Interactive State of the Art Maps&#039; target=&quot;_blank&quot;  rel=&quot;noopener noreferrer&quot;&gt;Interactive State of the Art Maps&lt;\/a&gt;\"><h4 class='av_iconlist_title iconlist_title  '  itemprop=\"headline\" ><a href='http:\/\/maps.gargantext.org\/maps\/opinionDynamics\/' title='Interactive State of the Art Maps' target=\"_blank\"  rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Interactive State of the Art Maps<\/a><\/h4><\/header><div class='iconlist_content '  itemprop=\"text\" ><p>Browse the<a href=\"http:\/\/maps.gargantext.org\/maps\/opinionDynamics\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> two GarganText state of the art maps<\/a> on &#8220;Opinion dynamics&#8221; and &#8220;recommender and social media&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><footer class=\"entry-footer\"><\/footer><\/article><div class=\"iconlist-timeline\"><\/div><\/li>\n<li><a href='http:\/\/maps.gargantext.org\/phylo\/phylo_opinion_dynamics\/' title='interactive phylomemy'  target=\"_blank\"  rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" class='iconlist_icon av-431x8v-002b3067f92f56068f30d570d5a5a451 avia-font-entypo-fontello avia-iconfont avia-font-entypo-fontello'><span class='av-icon-char' data-av_icon='\ue8d9' data-av_iconfont='entypo-fontello' aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/span><\/a><article class=\"article-icon-entry \"  itemscope=\"itemscope\" itemtype=\"https:\/\/schema.org\/BlogPosting\" itemprop=\"blogPost\" ><div class=\"iconlist_content_wrap\"><header class=\"entry-content-header\" aria-label=\"Icon: &lt;a href=&#039;http:\/\/maps.gargantext.org\/phylo\/phylo_opinion_dynamics\/&#039; title=&#039;interactive phylomemy&#039; target=&quot;_blank&quot;  rel=&quot;noopener noreferrer&quot;&gt;interactive phylomemy&lt;\/a&gt;\"><h4 class='av_iconlist_title iconlist_title  '  itemprop=\"headline\" ><a href='http:\/\/maps.gargantext.org\/phylo\/phylo_opinion_dynamics\/' title='interactive phylomemy' target=\"_blank\"  rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">interactive phylomemy<\/a><\/h4><\/header><div class='iconlist_content '  itemprop=\"text\" ><p>Browse the interactive phylomemy of Opinion dynamics literature. Almost 30 years of evolution under your finger tips.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><footer class=\"entry-footer\"><\/footer><\/article><div class=\"iconlist-timeline\"><\/div><\/li>\n<li><a href='https:\/\/doi.org\/10.7910\/DVN\/WRFMMU' title='Data for replication'  target=\"_blank\"  rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" class='iconlist_icon av-2gwqb3-eed1b7ed54d36c77d40cbfc0323c2725 avia-font-entypo-fontello avia-iconfont avia-font-entypo-fontello'><span class='av-icon-char' data-av_icon='\ue8d3' data-av_iconfont='entypo-fontello' aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/span><\/a><article class=\"article-icon-entry \"  itemscope=\"itemscope\" itemtype=\"https:\/\/schema.org\/BlogPosting\" itemprop=\"blogPost\" ><div class=\"iconlist_content_wrap\"><header class=\"entry-content-header\" aria-label=\"Icon: &lt;a href=&#039;https:\/\/doi.org\/10.7910\/DVN\/WRFMMU&#039; title=&#039;Data for replication&#039; target=&quot;_blank&quot;  rel=&quot;noopener noreferrer&quot;&gt;Data for replication&lt;\/a&gt;\"><h4 class='av_iconlist_title iconlist_title  '  itemprop=\"headline\" ><a href='https:\/\/doi.org\/10.7910\/DVN\/WRFMMU' title='Data for replication' target=\"_blank\"  rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Data for replication<\/a><\/h4><\/header><div class='iconlist_content '  itemprop=\"text\" ><p>Data associated to this paper are available on Harvard Dataverse: <span class=\"citation-select\">Bouchaud, Paul; Chavalarias, David; Maziyar, Panahi, 2024, &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.7910\/DVN\/WRFMMU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Replication Data for<\/a>: Chavalarias, Bouchaud, Panahi (2023) Can a single line of code change society? The systemic risks for global information flow, opinion dynamics and social structures of recommender systems optimizing engagement&#8221;, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.7910\/DVN\/WRFMMU\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">https:\/\/doi.org\/10.7910\/DVN\/WRFMMU<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><footer class=\"entry-footer\"><\/footer><\/article><div class=\"iconlist-timeline\"><\/div><\/li>\n<\/ul><\/div><\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":3300,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,32,33,17,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alire","category-news","category-politoscope","category-publication","category-toread"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3295"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3295\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3315,"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3295\/revisions\/3315"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iscpif.fr\/chavalarias\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}