Opinion Dynamics: Applications and Fundamentals

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue focuses on theoretical and applied research in opinion dynamics, addressing the development and analysis of models as well as their applications. Opinion dynamics investigates how individuals’ beliefs and attitudes evolve through interaction, describing collective behaviors such as consensus, polarization, and fragmentation. By integrating methods from control theory, statistical physics, network science, and data analysis, these models contribute to understanding the mechanisms that influence opinion evolution in different contexts such as social, political, and economic systems. In this framework, entropy-based measures and information-theoretic tools quantify opinion diversity, information exchange, and uncertainty reduction in social systems.

The Special Issue will include theoretical and applied contributions that advance the understanding of opinion formation and influence processes through modeling, analytical studies, control approaches, statistical physics frameworks, and data-driven implementations. Topics of interest include model formulation, stability and convergence analysis, microscopic interaction rules, entropy-based quantification of collective behavior, and applications in areas such as misinformation spreading, collective decision making, and coordination in networked environments.

Topics of interest:

• Opinion dynamics models;
• Social influence and sociophysical modeling;
• Entropy and information-theoretic measures in social systems;
• Asymptotic social behaviors;
• Control and intervention algorithms on social networks;
• Learning and adaptation in social systems;
• Data-driven modeling and identification of social interaction patterns;
• Practical applications of models through real-world data or experiments.

Dr. Carmela Bernardo
Dr. Piotr Bródka
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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