eprintid: 50585
rev_number: 8
eprint_status: archive
userid: 1482
importid: 105
dir: disk0/00/05/05/85
datestamp: 2025-03-14 12:29:17
lastmod: 2025-03-14 12:30:33
status_changed: 2025-03-14 12:29:17
type: monograph
metadata_visibility: show
creators_name: Gelastopoulos, Alexandros
creators_name: Analytis, Pantelis
creators_name: Le Mens, Gael
creators_name: Van De Rijt, Arnout
creators_id: alexandros.gelastopoulos@iast.fr
creators_idrefppn: 283720182
creators_idrefppn: 273120999
creators_halaffid: 506116; 1002422
title: The marginal majority effect: when social influence produces lock-in
ispublished: pub
subjects: subjects_ECO
abstract: People are influenced by the choices of others, a phenomenon observed across contexts in the social and behavioral sciences. Social influence can lock in an initial popularity advantage of an option over a higher quality alternative. Yet several experiments designed to enable social influence have found that social systems self-correct rather than lock-in. Here we identify a behavioral phenomenon that makes inferior lock-in possible, which we call the ‘marginal majority effect’: A discontinuous increase in the choice probability of an option as its popularity exceeds that of a competing option. We demonstrate the existence of marginal majority effects in several recent experiments and show that lock-in always occurs when the effect is large enough to offset the quality effect on choice, but rarely otherwise. Our results reconcile conflicting past empirical evidence and connect a behavioral phenomenon to the possibility of social lock-in.
date: 2024-07-22
date_type: published
publisher: arXiv
official_url: http://tse-fr.eu/pub/130403
faculty: tse
divisions: tse
keywords: social influence
keywords: self-reinforcing process
keywords: self-correcting process
keywords: marginal majority
keywords: lock-in
language: en
has_fulltext: TRUE
view_date_year: 2024
full_text_status: public
monograph_type: working_paper
series: arXiv
place_of_pub: Toulouse
pages: 35
institution: Université Toulouse Capitole
department: Toulouse School of Economics / Institute For Advanced Study in Toulouse
book_title: arXiv
oai_identifier: oai:tse-fr.eu:130403
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oai_lastmod: 2025-03-03T09:20:06Z
oai_set: tse
site: ut1
hal_id: hal-04991399
hal_passwd: hn9qf08
hal_version: 1
hal_url: https://hal.science/hal-04991399
citation:   Gelastopoulos, Alexandros <https://www.idref.fr/283720182>, Analytis, Pantelis, Le Mens, Gael and Van De Rijt, Arnout <https://www.idref.fr/273120999>  (2024) The marginal majority effect: when social influence produces lock-in.  arXiv, Toulouse     
document_url: https://publications.ut-capitole.fr/id/eprint/50585/1/2408.03952v1.pdf