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Professor Smaldino Finds Evidence for Mathematical Theory of Sneaky Signals

March 4, 2022

Cognitive and Information Sciences Professor Paul SmaldinoMuch of online conversation today consists of signaling one’s political identity. When communicating in mixed groups, do people use "covert" signals that are recognizable by their own political in-group but easy for outsiders to miss?

Cognitive and Information Sciences Professor Paul Smaldino answered this question in a paper published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Smaldino developed a mathematical theory of covert signaling and, working with a team of collaborators, confirmed the model's predictions using a large sample of tweets. Read more