Stimulation Mechanism Design in Social Networks

Different from ordinary basic network, social network is based on real interpersonal relationship. Studying the structural characteristics of the network is very important for further promoting the development of the network. The research on the structure includes not only basic research on infrastructure, such as network Scale, node reachability, distance between nodes, etc., as well as exceptionally complicated special structure studies, including Degree Centrality, Closeness Centrality and Between's centrality, and many more. Many scholars in the United States pay attention to the importance of the location of the nodes in the network and the related research on the aggregation and reciprocity of the nodes.

Social networks will be in different nodes, centers, and their behavior will change with the surrounding environment, not only that, the behavior of individuals in the social networking is also a very complex process. In addition to the satisfaction of self-awareness needs in online offline society before, social psychology and social network environment provide more convenient expression for Internet users, easier to find groups, and easier to go "herding effect." The author Tang Xingtong that the complexity of the nodes in social networks, coupled with many user experience to set an effective incentive mechanism will be very challenging.

The design of stimulus mechanisms in social networks is a big topic. For different situations have different needs: as the group has just established, how to stimulate the user to join, how to make the user multiple visits? How to mobilize the enthusiasm of users in the network of public relations communications, so that they spontaneously disseminate information coverage forums, qq, micro Bo? How to realize the emotional and rationalization of users in social networks ? How to achieve crowdsourcing, make the netizen coordinate and accomplish it before it is completed a certain task (such as wikipedia).

We can think from the aspects of social cognition, social exchange and social psychology.

The content of social cognition involves three levels respectively: first, the cognition of individuals, including their own and others' various ideas and psychological activities; secondly, the inter-human Cognition of bilateral relations, such as understanding of the relationship between friendship, authority, cooperation and conflict; Third, the cognition of various social relations within and between groups. Social cognition focuses on people's subjective consciousness. When we carry out the design of the stimulus mechanism in the social network, we need to think how to think about the subjective consciousness of the user. Each person's positive evaluation of his ability can trigger self A strong sense of self-esteem and pride, so everyone has the desire to express this ability to external, so as to obtain a positive evaluation.

The theory of social exchange is the original equal exchange principle and principle of reciprocity that you help me and I help you. The principle of "self-interest" and "reciprocity" need to be considered in the design of stimulus mechanism of social network. The higher the interdependence of the network in which netizens are located, the more obvious the reciprocity between individuals.

When individuals and groups have a strong sense of identity, believing that social network members consider themselves obliged to participate in the community and agree to adhere to the relevant group rules, they gradually enter the social networking core. Obligation to individuals in social networks refers to the responsibility to help others, individuals are willing to contribute valuable advice precisely because of this sense of responsibility to the community, I believe their own direction can be rewarded.

Case Study: (Selection)

1 social game (social game) Stimulation mechanism settings:

How do you think strategically from the perspective of stimulating social game design? Think of social cognition, social exchange, and player psychology.

The most basic, avatar to have intimacy

Provide enough money to play games for the player

Provide attractive props

Rare props or stage only for advanced users

Allow users to gain advantage from the beginning

Focus on what can be given

Exposure in the key positions of the top players to stimulate competition

Nonstop gifts, colleagues have the chance to win awards and more

Send the game's behavior (such as gifts, etc.) frequently to the user's friends

Luring users to invite friends only after entering the next stage of the game

Points, registrations, symbols and other Text index can be sufficient visual defects

The title and introduction are just enough for the user to understand the content

2. FACEBOOK social network stimulus set

Facebook user incentives, including having more friends and get the circle of recognition. FACEBOOK is always able to arouse people's most primitive instincts, this is a rewarding sign everywhere FACEBOOK, but it can arouse the heart of all users. People are eager to get their own identity, this little reward sign, you can make users feel their social identity in the community. Because of this small incentive, users are happy to keep logging in, updating their status, enriching their profile and uploading their own photos. This small incentive mechanism, in essence, inspired the user.

On the other hand, the group also to some extent reflects the personal values, style and personality. Personal status updates represent whether the user is online. Similarly, playing games also gives individuals the same incentive. The open social interaction is the driving force behind the user's exercise of any activity and to some extent exerts influence on others. For example: "Jane's status shows: JANE has just scored a high score in farm games." It is most likely to inspire his neighbors to start playing farm games as well.

The well-known Lewin formula from Germany's psychologist Kurt Lewin: B = ƒ (P.E.), which states that human behavior is determined by the influence of the common factors of individuals and the environment, that is to say, one of FACEBOOK The user's behavior, that is, represents his personal characteristics, but also represents his social relations FACEBOOK situation. Here, FACEBOOK is the environment in the formula. Socialization refers to a series of social relationships with users on FACEBOOK.

3. Digg able to operate the stimulus

From a mechanistic point of view, Digg website is actually a huge platform for the game - the user participating in the game must try to tap a variety of interesting fresh information and articles, as long as "Digg" is equivalent to the information submitted to the Digg. The reward is that readers will vote based on the content of your submission. The more readers you like, the more your articles rank higher in the DIGG and the more chances you see in your homepage leaderboard.

The more news / articles the user Digg, the more chances the participant will be on the list. Such a system motivates users to continually focus on various kinds of information to study what kind of information users prefer, which is similar to the function of a professional editor. In Digg, the user himself is the editor, we decide what kind of content is good, it is recommended content, think the article content is not good, you can "buried" it up. Of course, such a mechanism will have some negative consequences. For example, users may compile some fake junk messages in order to gain higher popularity. Because of the mechanism as a whole, users are unconsciously concerned about / valued something other than news articles themselves.

Speaking at the FOWA conference in London, Digg's founder, Kevin Rose, talked about game theory and the importance of rewards for the self. In his speech, he also shared how Digg effectively motivated users to participate and Digg's programs in this area. In addition, he talked about the mechanisms behind the success of other emerging social media outlets, such as TWITTER.

Of course, there should be many more successful APP cases that successfully use the game reward mechanism. The most crucial point is how to integrate the game mechanics into their systems better and organically.