Cooperation Evolution in Multiplex Networks With the Heterogeneous Diffusion Model

Cooperation evolution emerges in diversities of social networks by way of individuals’ interactions and influence propagations. The influence on cooperation evolution owing to the multiplex nature of social networks and interactions is still an open question. In this work, we focus on the impacts of the individuals’ heterogeneous properties and the networks’ multilayer nature on cooperation evolution, and propose a heterogeneous diffusion model to describe and analyze the cooperation dynamics processes in diverse layers of multiplex networks with weighted values. We investigated how the interlayer and intralayer interactions with these heterogeneities influence individuals’ behaviors and strategies, and discussed how some important parameters impact the cooperation densities and evolution processes in the interactions of different strategy games. The experimental results show that the tighter interlayer interaction can obviously improve the cooperation densities in the strategy games SG, but has little impact on the cooperation evolution in the strategy games PD. The effect of individuals’ trust on cooperation diffusion is smaller in the games PD than in the games SG. The heterogeneity of degree distribution between individuals from interlayer networks also affects cooperation processes. This work explores and reveals the mechanism and regular pattern of cooperation diffusion considering the heterogeneities of individuals in multiplex networks with weighted values.