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I recall seeing references to studies about the spreading of true/false beliefs through social networks. I think this research tends to be grounded in game theory or evolutionary theory (like gene transmission), but I could be wrong.

Can anyone direct me to the research on this or point to seminal papers? I took a quick look at Google Scholar, but it's not clear where to start. I'm interested in theory papers, but I'm especially interested in empirical work. Any help would be great. Thanks.

mrt
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    One possibility is "memetics" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memetics, another is "small-world" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small-world_experiment, and possibly "social dynamics" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_dynamics – Arnon Weinberg Jul 15 '15 at 08:04
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    This question is dealt with in a book called "The Half Life of Facts" by Samuel Arbesman. I might answer your question directly soon. – Vakalate Jul 15 '15 at 08:26
  • @ArnonWeinberg I think memetics is definitely a good keyword here. Thanks! – mrt Jul 15 '15 at 08:45

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Check out Networks, Crowds, and Markets (David Easley and Jon Kleinberg, 2010), esp. chapters 16 and 19.

pythonist
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