The Physicists are Doing Sociology!

In another rather mathematical paper -- but don't get in the habit of turning away because of that: we can get something from the introduction and conclusion that's useful, even if we don't work our way through the math.  Plus it points us to an interesting area of research we didn't know about -- evolutionary game theory.

"Evolutionary Dynamics of Populations with Conflicting Interactions:Classification and Analytical Treatment Considering Asymmetry and Power"

Dirk Helbing and Anders Johansson

arXiv:0911.0359v1 [physics.soc-ph] 2 Nov 2009

Evolutionary game theory examines systems in which many entities have competitive interactions and have the opportunity to adjust the strategies they use based on their own results and the results of entities around them.  In this paper, the researchers -- physicists -- look at systems consisting of two populations with conflicting interactions.  The interactions are modeled as  four different types of games, each characterized by a qualitatively different system dynamics: the harmony game, the prisoner's dilemma, the stag-hunt game and the snow- drift game.  When applied to social systems, the latter three describe social dilemma situations. However, in the presence of multiple populations, we may not only have the dilemma that people may choose not to cooperate; their behaviors in different populations may also be uncoordinated. Accordingly, the establishment of cooperation is only one challenge in social systems, while the establishment of commonly shared behaviors ("social norms") is another one.(modified from author abstract and paper conclusion).

See also

Video Lecture by Helbing (and a slide show that goes with it) 
"VirtualLabs in evolutionary game theory" by Christoph Hauert.