Volume 17 - Article 3 | Pages 59–82  

The "Wedding-Ring": An agent-based marriage model based on social interaction

By Francesco Billari, Alexia Prskawetz, Belinda Aparicio Diaz, Thomas Fent

Abstract

In this paper we develop an agent-based marriage model based on social interaction. We build an population of interacting agents whose chances of marrying depend on the availability of partners, and whose willingness to marry depends on the share of relevant others in their social network who are already married. We then let the typical aggregate age pattern of marriage emerge from the bottom-up. The results of our simulation show that micro-level hypotheses founded on existing theory and evidence on social interaction can reproduce age-at-marriage patterns with both realistic shape and realistic micro-level dynamics.

Author’s Affiliation

• Francesco Billari - Università Bocconi, Italy EMAIL
• Alexia Prskawetz - Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital (IIASA, OeAW, University of Vienna), Austria EMAIL
• Belinda Aparicio Diaz - Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Austria EMAIL
• Thomas Fent - Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Austria EMAIL

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