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Updated: Jul 11, 2026

The HoneyComb Paradigm for Research on Collective Human Behavior
Published on: January 19, 2019
Global pattern formation and ethnic/cultural violence
May Lim1, Richard Metzler, Yaneer Bar-Yam
1New England Complex Systems Institute, 24 Mt. Auburn Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.
Abstract:
We identify a process of global pattern formation that causes regions to differentiate by culture. Violence arises at boundaries between regions that are not sufficiently well defined. We model cultural differentiation as a separation of groups whose members prefer similar neighbors, with a characteristic group size at which violence occurs. Application of this model to the area of the former Yugoslavia and to India accurately predicts the locations of reported conflict. This model also points to imposed mixing or boundary clarification as mechanisms for promoting peace.
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