SpreadingActivation

A model for things like: you are thinking of A and it reminds you of thought B, which reminds you of thought C.

In spreading activation, you can “activate” node A, which is connected to B, which is connected to C, and C gets activated to some extent.

For example, say you have a graph where the nodes are thoughts. Associated with each node at each time step is some amount of “activation”. The links in the graph are associations between thoughts. If one thought gets activated, the activation “spreads” across links to similar thought nodes. And then the output again activates other inputs, thesis …

Spreading activation is a general idea that could be applied to lots of things. The canonical term paper Dissertation Essay Thesis Assignment example is modelling how one thought reminds you of other thoughts, but you could talk about other things with it; model people: politically active people get their friends riled up.. sufficiently riled up friends become activists themselves.. etc.

For more specific examples, see ProjectsUsingSpreadingActivation.

See also HebbianLearning?