Modelling and simulating attitudes formation and dynamics using beliefs ; Modélisation et simulation multi-agent de la formation et de la dynamique d'attitudes basées sur les croyances
We study in this thesis the problem of social attitude formation and dynamics using multi agent simulation. The concept of attitude could be defined as a global evaluation of a social object, based on cognitive or affective information. Our works belongs to the field of social simulation which aims to reproduce in a virtual environment complex social phenomenon at a macroscopic level based on microscopic representations of individuals and their interactions. While existing approaches in this field rarely consider the results of studies in human sciences on the topic of attitude, we propose to follow a psychomimtic approach by micro-founding the cognitive model of our agents on human and social sciences' theories on individual's perception, inter-personal and media communication, belief revision, affective responses and the sentiment of unexpectedness. This model aims to reproduce at a microscopic level attitude dynamics toward actors who perpetuate actions witnessed by the individuals. We have proceeded to a functional analysis of the model's various components based on abstracts scenarios in order to study the capabilities of our model, and more precisely the describable phenomenon such as information diffusion, resistance to disinformation or the conformity process. The model has been applied in the context of French military operations of stabilisation in Afghanistan. The goal of this experience consists in reproducing opinion polls results of the locals toward the present Forces, collected during the intervention, based on a military scenario which has been recreated in partnership with officers who were in charge of operations between 2011 and 2012. Simulation results that follow a model calibration process show an error below 3 points of disparity compared to the real data. Finally, we propose a microscopic analysis of the results by applying automatic classification techniques on the simulated individuals in order to explain the multiple attitudes tendencies in the population. ; Nous étudions dans cette ...