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Social Context and the Spread of HIV: A game-theoretic investigation on impacts of social stigma and HIV education on epidemic outcomes

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Article providing a theoretical foundation for analyzing how social stigma and adopted behavioral traits affect the transmission of HIV across a population.
creator Nguyen, Trang Kieu
creator Ferguson, William D. (Class of 1975) (Faculty/Staff)
Title Social Context and the Spread of HIV: A Game-theoretic Investigation on Impacts of Social Stigma and HIV Education on Epidemic Outcomes
Alternative TitleGame-theoretic investigation on impacts of social stigma and HIV education on epidemic outcomes
supporting host Grinnell College. Economics
Index Date 2014
Date Issued 25-Aug-2014
Date (Other) 25-Aug-2014
Publisher Grinnell College
Genre Essays
Digital Origin born digital
Extent 22 pages
Media Type application/pdf
description We provide a theoretical foundation for analyzing how social stigma and adopted behavioral traits affect the transmission of HIV across a population. We combine an evolutionary game-theoretic modelG??based on a relationship signaling stage gameG??with the SIR (susceptible-infected-recovered) model of disease transmission. Our evolutionary model specifies how two types of social stigmaG??that which accompanies an HIV+ condition and that which follows associating with an HIV+ partnerG??influence behavioral propensities to honestly report oneG??s condition (or not) and to unconditionally accept relationships (or not). With respect to reporting an HIV+ condition, we find that condition stigma impedes the fitness of honest reporting, whereas association stigma impedes the relative fitness of concealing an HIV+ condition; and both propensities can coexist in a polymorphic equilibrium. By linking our model to the SIR model, we find that condition stigma unambiguously enhances disease transmission by discouraging both honest reporting and a societyG??s acceptance of AIDS education, whereas association stigma has an ambiguous impact: on one hand it can impede HIV transmission by discouraging concealing behavior and unconditional relationship acceptance, but it also compromises a societyG??s acceptance of AIDS education. Our relatively simple evolutionary/SIR model offers a foundation for numerous theoretical extensionsG??such as applications to social network theoryG??as well as foundation for many testable empirical hypotheses.
citation Social Context and the Spread of HIV: A game-theoretic investigation on impacts of social stigma and HIV education on epidemic outcomes, William D. Ferguson and Trang Kieu Nguyen, Economies, August, 2014, 2, 171-192; doi:10.3390/economies2030171. ~ citation/reference
Language English
Topic Stigma (Social Psychology)
Topic Game theory
Topic AIDS (Disease)
Classification HB
Related Item Faculty Scholarship
Related Item Scholarship at Grinnell
Related Item Digital Grinnell
Identifier (hdl) http://hdl.handle.net/11084/11646
Identifier (local) grinnell:11646
Access Condition Copyright to this work is held by the author(s), in accordance with United States copyright law (USC 17). Readers of this work have certain rights as defined by the law, including but not limited to fair use (17 USC 107 et seq.).
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