CATS-Mar-15-2013
Title[edit]
The Degree of Segregation in Social Networks
Speaker[edit]
Nicole Immorlica, Microsoft Research
Abstract[edit]
In 1969, economist Thomas Schelling introduced a landmark model of racial segregation in which individuals move out of neighborhoods where their ethnicity constitutes a minority. Simple simulations of Schelling's model suggest that this local behavior can cause global segregation effects. In this talk, we provide a rigorous analysis of Schelling's model on ring networks. Our results show that, in contrast to prior interpretations, the outcome is nearly integrated: the average size of an ethnically-homogenous region is independent of the size of the society and only polynomial in the size of a neighborhood.
Joint work with Christina Brandt, Gautam Kamath, and Robert D. Kleinberg.
