Collective phenomena in social animal dynamics

Abstract

Collective motion is a fascinating and well-proved behavior of social animals. Bird flocks, fish schools or sheep herds are common examples of that phenomenon. In the following paper, we analyze that kind of behavior of social animals, reproducing on that purpose the so called Vicsek model. In the model, animals copy their neighbors, averaging their direction of motion in each step with more or less precision depending on the intensity of a noise term. This gives raise to a phase transition between polarized and unpolarized states. We also analyze the effect of leadership and show that this new ingredient eliminates the phase transition.