Optimizing the Social Network in the SCARDO Model

Abstract

This article examines an optimal control problem focused on optimizing the structure of a social network to achieve a desired opinion distribution in the population within a finite time horizon. The opinion dynamics adhere to the SCARDO model, and the network structure is operationalized using a stochastic block model whose parameters are subject to adjustment. We derive an analytical result demonstrating that the problem under consideration can be reduced to a control problem in which the structure of the network is fixed, but the parameters of the ranking algorithm—integrated into the model—are optimized. The latter problem is already solved in the scholarly literature. This allows us to introduce a numerical algorithm for solving the initial control problem. Our findings have potential applications in designing friend recommendation systems for real-world social platforms.