Emergence of Cooperation in a Network Environment Introducing Social Distance

In this paper, emergence of cooperation in a network environment is explored. Interactions are modeled using a spatial prisoner’s dilemma in which social distance is introduced, reflecting the existence of homophily, the tendency of agents to interact with likes in terms of agent attributes, and the network of interaction links, which evolves adapting to the outcome of the game. We observed that different ranges of homophily produce a variety of network topologies. Results showed that the ranges of homophily are closely associated with the robustness of cooperation that emerges among network environments.