How Do Cultural Classes Emerge From Assimilation and Distinction? : An Extension of Cucker-Smale Model

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

When cultural tastes are not neutral but hierarchically matched to social classes, people assimilate themselves to higher classes by luxury consumption while distinguishing themselves from lower classes by developing new tastes. Extending a Cucker-Smale model for mutual influence among agents, we examine when and how cultural classes emerge from continuous distributions of tastes, through the assimilation-distinction (A-D) mechanism. We develop two different models, a local AD model and a global A-D model, and simulate the models, given various ranges of two parameters: (1) the strength and (2) the range of distinction relative to assimilation. In local AD models, both larger strength and larger range result to finer differentiation of tastes. Emerging classes are not clearly observed in local AD models. In global AD models, we observe flocking tastes and emerging cultural classes, whose number depends on the strength of distinction. Distance between classes depend on the range of distinction. Most notably, these characteristics of cultural classes in global AD models little depend on the initial distributions of cultural tastes, whether uniform, normal, or chi-square. Our findings may explain why luxury consumption is widely popularized across different cultures in the contemporary society.

목차 (Table of Contents)

• ABSTRACT
• 1. INTRODUCTION
• 2. THEORY AND MODEL OF ASSIMILATION-DISTINCTION
• 3. NUMERICAL SIMULATIONS
• 4. DISCUSSION
• 5. REFERENCES