Stabilizing Role of Uninformed Participants in Collective Decision Making

2026-06-08

AI Summary

This study investigates how uninformed individuals influence the stability and polarization dynamics of collective decision-making in leaderless groups. By constructing a second-order network model grounded in a dissipative Hamiltonian framework, informed agents are modeled as introducing directional bias, whereas uninformed agents contribute only nondirectional dissipation. Integrating bifurcation analysis with modular network modeling, the work reveals that although uninformed agents do not alter the static polarization threshold, their dissipative effect delays the system’s escape from the “ghost” of a saddle-node bifurcation, thereby significantly postponing the onset of observable polarization. The analysis further establishes the existence of a locally unique and exponentially stable compromise state under low-conflict conditions, offering a novel mechanism for understanding collective decision dynamics that transcends conventional structural connectivity paradigms.

Abstract

For groups without strict hierarchy, collective decisions often emerge through compromise. We develop a second-order network model of collective decision-making using a dissipative Hamiltonian formulation, in which informed agents introduce preferred directions while uninformed participants contribute only direction-free dissipation. We show that under low conflict, the model admits a locally unique, exponentially stable compromise state. Using a structured modular network we further show that as conflict increases the local compromise branch terminates through a saddle-node fold rather than through a smooth mean-field symmetry-breaking transition. Modular polarized states persist on branches that are locally separated from the compromise branch. Direction-free dissipation does not shift the static structural threshold, but it delays escape from the saddle-node ghost and pushes the observable onset of polarization to larger conflicts. Our work identifies a dissipation-mediated mechanism, complementary to connectivity-based accounts, through which uninformed participants stabilize collective behavior in biological and engineered swarms.

Problem

• collective decision making
• uninformed participants
• compromise stability
• polarization
• dissipation

Innovation

• dissipative Hamiltonian
• collective decision-making
• uninformed participants
• saddle-node bifurcation
• modular polarization