Essex Data Science Seminar Week 18: Dr Richard Mann

Join us for this week's Essex Data Science seminar, Spring Term 2024. Our ED-3S seminars are open to everyone, and offer a great opportunity to meet new people and join in with our community.

Dr Richard Mann (University of Leeds) will present this seminar on Collective decision-making by rational agents.

Abstract

The decisions made by others are a valuable source of social information about the world, because they may have knowledge that we lack. This means that when one agent makes a given choice, it can induce others to do so as well. In this talk I will describe a theory of rational agents who optimally utilise the social information provided by others, and explore the dynamics this produces at the individual and group level. In particular, I will show how the implicit beliefs such agents hold about the physical and social environment shape their response to each other, and how changes to the environment that conflict with these beliefs can dramatically alter collective behaviour and impact the success of groups.

How to attend

The seminar will be held in STEM 3.1 at 14:00 on Thursday 1 February. It is open to everyone, including the general public. Please contact Dr Jianya Lu (jianya.lu@essex.ac.uk) for further information.